


the riptide prince

by boo98 (butter)



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Royalty, Arranged Marriage, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Historical Fantasy, M/M, Slight slight mentions of violence, So much worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-13
Updated: 2017-05-11
Packaged: 2018-10-04 14:18:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 48,703
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10280645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/butter/pseuds/boo98
Summary: Choi Vernon doesn't know what to expect when he gets shipped overseas to tutor the youngest son of a foreign royal family. He really doesn't anticipate the whirlwind that is Prince Boo Seungkwan, nor the events of the next few months. In situations like this, he figures, you either sink or you swim.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! This is my first ongoing/chaptered fic but I have the whole thing planned out, and I should be able to post regularly. My current schedule is going to be new chapters on Mondays and Thursdays, but this may be subject to change.
> 
> If you have any questions about this AU or just want to say hi, as always my tumblr is boo98.tumblr.com!

The Southern capital doesn’t look _that_ different from back home, Vernon tells himself silently as he presses his forehead against the glass of the carriage window. The roads are just a bit narrower, everything a bit more packed together due to lack of space to spread out past its borders. That’s what happens when you surround your city with the sea, he supposes. He still feels like he can smell the salt off the waves, even though the interior of the carriage is equipped with the usual potpourri to drive off the smells of the outside world.

The carriage rumbles down the street, a combination of pavement and tiles that look like the same color as the sand of the beach where his ship had docked earlier that morning. They pass by a cluster of merchant stalls, tables laden heavy with fish and fruits that look just a bit off from the ones that he’s used to seeing. As they drive by people stop and turn to look, but not for long – it’s the capital, but more than that it’s a port city. They’re used to people coming and going.

He huffs and leans away from the window a bit, feeling a little too much like a kid for how he’s gawking at everything. The interior of the carriage is a bit nicer than he’s used to, that’s for sure. There are light, breezy curtains to be drawn across the windows tied back with a slim length of twisted rope that, when Vernon fingers it curiously, is silky to the touch.

Vernon’s the son of the Western ambassador to the Southern Kingdom – a nice position, but overall an administrative one. The West hasn’t been at war with the South for hundreds of years now; if nothing else they’re a trading partner, a bit of an economic annoyance but nothing dire.

He’d been the perfect choice to ship overseas when the Southern Kingdom asked for a Western tutor for their youngest prince, though – half Southern, half Western, and fluent in both languages, not to mention that he was the same age as the prince.

His mother had been delighted throughout the entire time she’d helped him pack up, insisting that this was going to be excellent experience for him when the time came for him to inherit his father’s position. Sofia had just sullenly hugged him goodbye before demanding one last time that he send souvenirs.

Vernon stretches his legs in front of him and is impressed when he can extend them fully without hitting the seats opposite him. This is a _really_ nice carriage.

They roll down the streets for a little while longer, and he almost doesn’t even notice when they begin to approach the castle. It’s only because they have to stop to allow the gate to slowly swing open to let them in, and the jerk of the horses being pulled to a halt shakes Vernon out of his doze. He hadn’t slept well on the ship – he was hoping that the welcome dinner wouldn’t be too extensive, and he could get to sleep early.

“Woah,” he mumbles to himself, and tries to rub a crick out of his neck as he leans back over to peer out the window. “Look at that.” The South has a walled castle, which at first he’d been hesitant about. It seemed a little arrogant, holding fast to older ideas of royalty and the need for separation between them and the populace. It’s beautiful, though, he can’t deny that.

The walls are built to almost 10 yards high, if he had to guess, made of the same warm sandstone as the tiled pavement that they had been driving over earlier. They’re at one of the side entrances, presumably because Vernon’s arrival isn’t exactly something to hold a huge ceremony about or anything, but the gate that opens is still more opulent than anything he’s seen in the city so far. It shines bronze in the low evening sun, and the carved bars trace suggestions of trees, branches entwined and reaching towards the sky. He can’t see who’s opening it from the view of his window, but after a moment they slowly start pulling forward through the gates.

They rumble past a few stalls, neatly tended to for the horses of visiting diplomats – Vernon guesses that’s what he is, technically. Before he knows it they stop, though, and the driver is off his seat and opening Vernon’s door for him before he can get it himself.

“Thanks,” he demurs, a little awkward as he tries to drop down from the carriage before the driver can call for a step to be brought for him. He manages to not stumble when he lands, and he takes a second to dust off the thighs of his trousers.

They’re parked by an unassuming-looking entrance to the castle, which is much more lowly-built than the castle at home. Rather than one structure, with floors and floors built on top of each other that spiral upward, the Southern castle is more like a compound. It’s a cluster of one- or two-story buildings with open-air walks between each, all built of the same sandstone material as the wall. The building they’re in front of now is just one story, with window-frames dotting the broad side facing them.

“Sir Choi!” Vernon twitches a bit at the unexpected honorific but nods at the woman who approaches him. She pulls to a stop in front of him and takes a second to bow, quickly and politely, and then straightens to give him an obvious once-over. She looks hard to read, with a round face and an upturned nose that makes her seem slightly unimpressed by him.

“I’m Nayoung, one of the castle caretakers. I’ll be showing you to your living quarters.” She gestures to the handful of boys behind her, who scamper to attention and begin unloading Vernon’s trunks from the back of the carriage. “We hope you’ll find yourself very comfortable in our country.”

“Ah, of course,” he assures her. “It’s a beautiful city.”

“Thank you,” she says, and looks pleased. “It is. You came at a good time of the year, you know. Had you been any earlier you would have run into the monsoons.” She indicates for him to walk with her, and as they approach the door to the building she points up at the windows. They’re completely open, no glass or anything in front of them but a large roll of some kind of material that sits at the bottom of each. “We’ve just finished taking down the rain screens, so the castle will be much airier now.” She shoots him a look that almost seems teasing. “It’ll be nice, for you, once summer comes in.”

Vernon blinks at her and tries to ignore the sweat he feels building on the back of his neck now that they’re out in the open. “You mean it’s not summer yet?” The air is humid and sticky with salt, although a cool evening breeze blows by every now and then.

Nayoung laughs softly and pulls the door open for him, letting him step through before she does. “Not quite. We have a little longer for spring, but soon the sun will be stronger. You’ll have to be careful,” she notes, “you’re very pale.”

“I’m sure,” Vernon replies, and follows her down the long hallway that they enter. He tugs at the cuffs of his shirt, a little uncomfortable in his Western clothes now that they’re here. Nayoung is wearing a loose blouse and a pair of trousers that only fall to mid-calf, leaving the rest of her leg bare over the reed slippers she has on. She has a filmy shawl pulled around her shoulders, and her hair is pinned up carefully in plaits. She looks absolutely nothing like the main housekeeper back at his family’s home, with her thick wool socks and clunky boots.

They pass by a few other servants, all in similarly loose outfits, who give them a quick nod as they go by but then continue on their way. Vernon feels a little like he’s dreaming, caught somewhere between a lack of sleep and general awe at being in a foreign land for the first time. His dad had told him stories about the South, of course, and he knows the basic customs, but to actually be here is something else entirely.

They turn a few times, heading further into the center of the building. At least, Vernon assumes that’s where they’re going. Hopefully he won’t be expected to navigate on his own any time soon. After a few minutes Nayoung stops them in front of a pale wooden door.

“These will be your living quarters for the time that you are with us,” she says, and slides the door back. It’s built like the screened-in rooms at the school his sister attends, where the door slides past the wall to open. She nods for him to enter first and so he does, and stops to look around blankly as she enters behind him. “We have prepared anything you might need but please do not hesitate to request something we may have forgotten.”

“I’m sure that won’t be necessary.” Vernon takes a second to make sure that his mouth isn’t gaping open. The rooms are huge, and flow into each other without solid walls to break them apart. They’ve walked into what seems like a living space, with a low table and sitting cushions, as well as a huge window that looks out into a small courtyard facing the outer wall. To the right is another screen, which is open and shows a smaller room with bookshelves. Maybe an office?

The screen to the left is closed, but Nayoung pads over to it and slides it open to show him.

“This will be your bedroom, and there’s a wash room further back,” she points with her hand extended flat, and Vernon peeks through the doorframe. The bed is in the Southern style, tucked in the corner on the floor, without a lifted bedframe but covered in a light blue comforter and several soft-looking pillows. There’s another window in this room, although this one has a thin shade pulled down over it that moves slightly in the breeze and remains opaque to the outside despite the light it lets in. At the back of the room is one final screen door, again closed, which he assumes is the wash room Nayoung mentioned.

“It all looks great.” He pulls back from the bedroom and Nayoung slides the screen closed again, then folds her hands in front of her. “Will I have time to unpack right now, or…?”

“Unfortunately no.” She glances out the window quickly, and he follows her eyes. The light outside is fading into a dull orange, no doubt because of the sun setting. “I’m to bring you to the dining room after showing you your rooms, but you should have plenty of time to settle in after dinner.”

Vernon tries not to make a face. He had been hoping he could at least wash up quickly – he feels like he just got off the ship, and hasn’t had time to rest at all between then and the drive to the castle. His skin feels tacky with salt water, but he guesses he should probably get used to the feeling. “Sounds good.”

Nayoung gives him a wry look, as if she knows what he’s thinking. “The royal family won’t all be there tonight. Her Majesty is off on business so it’ll just be the Crown Princess and the prince, as well as a few members of the cabinet.”

He grins at her, and tugs at the collar of his shirt. “Fairly casual, then?”

She doesn’t laugh but her eyes sparkle a little, and she ducks her head to look him over one more time. “You look very educated, which they will like.”

He does laugh, and they take off again down the hallways. This time they only turn once before leaving the building he’s in, and pass through one of the open walkways to get to the next building. This one is taller, at least two stories above ground, and the more intricate patterns on the screen door they walk up to indicate that they’re closer to actual royalty now.

He’s a little taken aback when they turn on the porch instead of going through the door into the building, and Nayoung leads him down the side, against the outer wall. They turn the corner and are faced with a light screen, with a slit opening that they duck through.

This side of the porch is much broader, at least the size of his rooms, with low garden boxes on the outer sides and a line of servants bordering the wall of the building. In the middle of it all is a low table, made of a highly polished amber-colored wood and covered with dozens of small dishes of food, each left open to the air.

Vernon glances back at the screen surrounding the porch. Good for keeping the bugs out, he supposes. There’s no one sitting at the table but a tall man greets them when they enter, his grin wide and white against his tan skin.

“Welcome to the Southern kingdom, Sir Choi,” he says, his voice pleasantly low. “I’m Mingyu, I’ve been assigned to show you around while you get used to the castle.” Mingyu gestures towards the table and Vernon follows his lead to sit at one of the sides. He watches, amused, as Mingyu folds himself down on the cushion next to him – he seems like he’s all limbs.

“I’m the apprentice to the lead royal engineer,” Mingyu explains. “I, uh, spent a year or two studying in the West, so I guess they thought I would be good to accompany you.”

“Do you speak Western?” Vernon asks in the language, genuinely curious – he hadn’t expected to be able to use his first language here, but it would be nice. Mingyu just kind of blinks at him before shaking his head, laughing.

“Ok, um, I understood you, but I really can’t speak very much at all,” he replies in Southern. “I mostly learned architectural and engineering terms, so I’m awful at anything conversational.” He leans back a little on the heels of his palms, which Vernon takes as a cue that he can relax his posture slightly as well. “I know how strange it can be to be living in a foreign kingdom, though, so I figure a friendly face can help?”

Vernon grins back. “Yeah, of course. I appreciate it.” He glances around, unsure. “Is the royal family joining us?” Or anyone else at all, for that matter.

Mingyu starts, as if he forgot something, and nods. “Oh, yeah. Someone’s probably running to fetch them now, we were waiting on you to arrive.” He barely finishes his sentence before the door to the inside of the building slides open, and a servant steps through.

“Permission to introduce the family and their guests?” he asks, and Nayoung nods at him from her place near the screened entrance.

Vernon moves to stand up but Mingyu pulls him back down. “Stay seated, it’s fine. You being here first is respect enough.”

He nods, but still feels awkward as the first of the cabinet members enter and take their seats around the table. They’re all more minor positions but still important, people like the ministers of agriculture and various trade sectors. Mingyu nods at them each as they enter, and Vernon is quick to copy the motion.

Soon the table is almost full, except for the side directly across from him. There’s a pause in the movement at the door, and a few of the ministers turn to mutter to the person next to them. Vernon glances at Nayoung, who is shooting a sharp look at the servant who was introducing everyone as they entered. The servant in question, a young, weedy-looking boy, has half his body ducked through the door into the building, and looks like he’s deep in conversation with someone inside.

Vernon shifts uncomfortably on the cushion he’s seated on. He’s never been a huge fan of the whole ritualistic, traditional part of dealing with royalty. Nothing is easy, so nothing goes smoothly, and it’s always awkward to pretend like you don’t notice the gaps in what is supposed to be the impeccably smooth proceedings of the upper-most classes.

The servant seems to come to an agreement with whoever he’s talking to inside the building, as he pulls himself back to his spot next to the door. He nods a little in Nayoung’s direction, and then holds his hand out the way he’s been doing this whole time – palm up, gestured towards the door but far enough away to give the person their space. “Her royal highness, the crown princess of the Southern Kingdom, Boo Jinseol.”

Vernon blinks. The crown princess already? He had been pretty sure they were going in order of sovereignty, with the crown princess at the end. They should have introduced the prince by now. He feels Mingyu shift next to him too, but he doesn’t say anything.

The figures inside the building shift and then the crown princess steps out. Vernon’s seen her portrait before but that had been taken years ago. She’s almost in her 30’s at this point, and looks the picture of grace. Her dark hair is pinned up similarly to Nayoung’s, held up off her neck but in much more intricate designs. She’s wearing the kind of high-waisted gowns that are traditional in the kingdom, the type that skim off the floor and make her look like she’s floating across water as she walks. Hers is in peach and pink tones, the colors light against the tan of her skin.

Jinseol puts her hands together in front of her and bows slightly to the table, and Vernon is quick to bow back from his seated position. “Thank you all for coming,” she murmurs, and her voice carries throughout the room despite the sound of the world outside that is allowed in through the thin screen. “I hope you will enjoy dinner.”

She sits gracefully, just enough to the side of her end of the table that she leaves a conspicuously-empty spot to her left. Vernon glances at Mingyu, who looks back at him and shrugs a little.

The second that Jinseol sits the servants spring into action and circle the room to pour tea for everyone. Vernon keeps an eye on everyone else, knowing that it was traditional in the South for the newest to the table to wait for everyone else to take food before helping oneself.

He ends up not having to wait long, because Jinseol quickly serves herself vegetables from one of the dishes close to her elbow. “We’ll eat, first,” she assures the table, lips curved in a smile as she glances at them all. “Food before politics.” The ministers chuckle in agreement, and Mingyu huffs a nervous laugh before taking a sip of his tea.

Vernon eats. It’s mostly vegetables, all prepared different ways and lightly seasoned. There’s a few different types of fish as well, but no other meat. He’d heard that they rarely ate anything else but this, especially outside the capital. The islands that made up the Southern kingdom were relatively small, and any space for agriculture was carefully used – cattle and the like were needed for farming, not for lining the stomachs of the rich.

He listens to the casual conversation of everyone else, and responds politely as the minister closest to him – in charge of irrigation line planning, he’s pretty sure he said – asks him about a Western novelist he’s read before. Vernon notices, though, as the servants against the wall continue whispering to each other during breaks in the service, casting wary looks to the door to the inside of the building.

The servants are clearing the dishes away when the boy servant from earlier emerges from inside. He motions for Nayoung, who hisses something in his ear and tilts her head towards Jinseol.

Jinseol doesn’t even look away from her cup of tea, which she has clasped between two hands as a servant refills it. “Do we have an addition to our party at last?” She hums when the servant boy nods, and takes what looks like a bracing sip from her cup before setting it down and nodding. “Introduce him, then.”

The boy clears his throat, takes his place at the door again, and gestures towards it like before. “His royal highness, Prince Boo Seungkwan.”

Vernon straightens up immediately, heart pounding a little harder. The prince, the one he’ll be spending the next few months tutoring. The closest idea he had for what he looked like came from the same portrait with Jinseol in it that hung in his father’s office, which had been done when the prince could have been no older than maybe twelve. He was 22 now, the same age as Vernon.

The royal family had all been in black in the portrait; it was commissioned in honor of the death of the Royal Consort, their father, over 10 years ago now. Perhaps that is why Vernon is so stunned when Prince Seungkwan, present day Prince Seungkwan, whirls through the door and onto the porch in a blur of color.

He’s in robes of a similar, if more masculine cut to the dress Jinseol is in, all dyed in rich jewel shades of deep crimson and warm amber. The servants have had to light the lamps that run the length of the room by now, the sun finally having set while they were eating, and their warm glow catches against the high planes of the prince’s face when he pauses to bow to them.

“It’s an honor,” he says, tone rushed. Vernon takes him in as he hurries to sit next to his sister, who looks at him with a stern set to her jaw. Seungkwan’s hair is lighter than Jinseol’s, a sun-bleached brown compared to her inky black, but their skin is the same smooth tan. They really look strikingly similar, seated next to each other the way they are, even dressed in complementary colors. They both have wide eyes and round faces with high cheekbones, and their lips are both pursed almost bird-like as they share a glance.

Jinseol raises an eyebrow at Seungkwan, and he rolls his eyes – Vernon blinks, not sure he really saw that right at first – and looks back at everyone. “I apologize deeply for my lateness,” he adds, and tips forward over the table a little in the semblance of a bow. His gaze skims everyone, eyes catching on Vernon’s for just a second before skipping past. “I was – sidetracked by official business.”

Vernon’s pretty sure that’s bullshit, from the look Jinseol has in her eyes, but no one would be rude enough to say anything about it. The ministers all nod to him, and Jinseol pats him on the shoulder lightly with one hand.

“You have perfect timing for one thing, my brother; we were about to discuss the subject of your new tutor.” That’s news to Vernon – they had been deep in a conversation about the predictions for a dry summer this year before the prince had arrived.

Seungkwan blinks at his sister, and then looks across the table at Vernon. “Oh.”

There’s a pause, and Vernon figures that now is as good a time as any. “I’m Choi Vernon,” he says, and nods a bit more deeply than maybe he needs to, but it still feels weird to be introducing himself to royalty while seated. “I just arrived from the Western kingdom today. I look forward to being your instructor, it’s an honor.”

Seungkwan looks at him, eyebrows a little furrowed. “Your Southern is really good.”

“I speak it at home sometimes,” Vernon says, having expected this reaction. “My father grew up in the South, and taught the language to my sister and I as we were growing up. I – um, it’s definitely not perfect, but I’m confident in the language.”

Seungkwan nods at him, the light glinting on the side of his face near his jawline. He’s wearing earrings, Vernon notices; thin, golden bars that hang down a few inches from the lobe of his ear.

“That’s good.” He looks down at the table, poking at the tea cup that a servant has placed down for him. “Um. Welcome to the Southern kingdom.”

And that seems to be all Prince Seungkwan is interested in saying to him for the time being. Jinseol gives him a beat to continue before picking the conversation back up herself, which Vernon finds he’s thankful for. She’s obviously perfected the art of diplomatic small talk, and they all continue a pleasantly inane conversation about the weather while the sky outside darkens completely into a deep black.

Finally, Jinseol pushes her tea cup further away from her, towards the center of the table. “If you will all excuse us, we should retire for the evening,” she says, and Seungkwan hurriedly moves his cup as well. “I would like to thank you all for dining with us. I’d also like to welcome Sir Choi to our kingdom, of course.” She smiles right at Vernon for the first time. “I do hope you’ll enjoy your time here. I’m sure you’ll be able to teach my little brother a thing or two.”

Seungkwan pouts deeply at his sister but doesn’t say anything, and everyone in the room nods as the two siblings stand in a flurry of sunset-shaded fabric. They bow simultaneously, hands folded in front of them, and then Seungkwan follows his sister back into the building.

The ministers all shuffle out over the course of the next few minutes, and Vernon finally manages to turn back to Mingyu, who looks just as shell-shocked as Vernon feels, for his part.

“And that’s the royal family,” Vernon says lowly, grinning when Mingyu looks at him to make sure he knows he’s kidding, a little. “They seem to keep things interesting.”

Mingyu barks out a laugh that’s a little too loud and they both rise off the floor, shaking their legs out as they stand. “I suppose so. That wasn’t even all of them, too – you should see it when Princess Sojeong is there with them.”

Vernon huffs a laugh. “I can imagine.” He casts a thoughtful look back to the doorway that they had all disappeared into. “Prince Seungkwan – is he normally quiet like that, or just having an off day?”

Mingyu shrugs, and nods at Nayoung when she hovers just far enough away from them to not seem intrusive. “I can take him back to his rooms, if you want?”

Nayoung hesitates, but then agrees. “He’s in the north-east building, in the rooms saved for the Western ambassador.”

“Got it,” Mingyu grins at her, and the two of them head back out the way Vernon came. “As for the prince, I don’t really know. He’s not around for a lot of the official stuff, you know? ‘Cuz he’s the youngest, and all.”

Vernon nods. “Third in line for the throne, not that high a priority?”

“I wouldn’t say that. More like, he can get away with skipping out on some of the more formal engagements. The second daughter, Sojeong, is on the path of the church, and Prince Seungkwan just kind of got sent off to school for a lot of the time while he was growing up.”

They head through the open-air walkway between buildings, and Vernon takes a second to look up at the sky. They get more stars, out here in the islands, and constellations that he doesn’t always see at home. “He’s getting trained for foreign relations, though?”

Mingyu makes a considering noise under his breath. “I suppose. I’m not that in tune with the royal family’s latest politics, but since you’re here it looks like that must be so.” They head into the building from earlier, where Vernon’s rooms are. “I would get used to him being late like he was tonight, though.”

Vernon chances a look at him, but Mingyu doesn’t seem concerned. “Really?”

Mingyu glances over at him and smiles lopsidedly. “Probably. I hear he skips like half his lessons with his other tutors as it is.” He shakes his head as they slow to a halt in front of a door – it must be Vernon’s but honestly it looks identical to all the others that they’ve walked past so far. “His best friend is the son of the minister of finance and he’s just the same, if not worse. Any time the handmaids are sent to fetch either of them they have to spend a good twenty minutes looking up all the trees, because the two of them have usually just climbed up them to avoid having to do anything.”

Vernon frowns. He’s never worked within the Western castle, at least not enough to interact with their royal family at all, but he’d always been under the impression that they were held under a tight watch. “And he gets away with that?”

Mingyu shrugs, hands in his pockets now. “I guess? He’s the baby of the family, so.”

“So he gets away with that.” Vernon huffs, a little amazed. “Well, I’ll have to keep you updated. His primary tutor sent me his schedule, and we’re supposed to have our first lesson tomorrow at 10.”

Mingyu snorts. “And you’ll let me know if he shows up?”

“Sounds like it.” Vernon shakes his head but grins up at the other man. “Thanks, you know, for this. It’s nice to have a familiar face from the beginning.”

Mingyu smiles back brightly. “Of course. Sleep well, then, I know you’ve had a long day.” Vernon nods, and slides back the door to his rooms as Mingyu meanders back down the hallway. Someone has come in and lit the lanterns since he was at dinner, and his trunks are laid out on the floor in the main room when he walks in.

He has to take a second to just stand in the room, sure he would look like an idiot to anyone else as he lingers in the middle of the floor. Toeing off his shoes, he marvels at how cool the stone of the flooring is to the touch as he pads over to haul one of the trunks open. Pauses.

Vernon lowers himself onto the ground by the table in the main room, kneeling on a braided area carpet, and reaches to pull out the white envelope that’s been placed on top of a pile of some of his books. An envelope that hadn’t been there when he was packing.

Underneath it is a paper-wrapped package, clearly another hardcover book when he picks it up, but Vernon opens the envelope first. He knows who it’s from immediately – Sophia has never gotten rid of her habit of trailing her lines of writing slightly upward at the ends, no matter how many penmanship classes she takes.

_Brother,_

_Mother said that I should write you a letter for you to be able to read on the ship tomorrow, but I told her that you get seasick whenever you try read on boats. I don’t know why she always forgets that, since you got sick all over her favorite shawl the last time that we took the boat to visit our cousins near the Northern border. Either way, I figured I should put this somewhere you won’t find it until you actually get there, so you can thank me for that._

_Do they really act that differently over there? Dad says that half the time they don’t even use chairs, they just sit on the floor, but Dad also says that there are dragons that live on some of the Southernmost islands, and that fire erupts from their caves underground, so I don’t really believe anything he says. I hope they don’t think you’re too strange with all your Western ways. I also hope that you don’t give their Prince too much homework, like my tutors do. He’s old enough to be married, he probably doesn’t need you assigning him all sorts of essays to write every day._

_Mom says that she hopes that you meet a nice girl while you’re away, but I know she secretly wants you to marry that girl here, that blonde daughter of one of the women that she quilts with. Please don’t marry that girl. She laughed at me one time when I had to pull the cat away from some fish skeletons in the compost, and, either way, her nose is really weird._

_Anyways, I thought that you’ll be too busy to write to me every day like you should, so I got you this journal. Well, Mom got it, but I told her what I wanted. Write in this journal every day, ok? Especially if anything really strange happens over there. Maybe if you see a dragon. I’ve never been further from home than just over the edge of the Northern border, you know that. I’ll have a lot to catch up on when you come home._

_Love,_

_Sophia_

Vernon unfolds the paper around the package to find, of course, a journal. It’s leather-bound but the color is a little more like a deep caramel than any of the other journals he owns. Ridiculously, he is reminded of the burnt umber color of the inner slip of the Prince’s robes at dinner that night, the way that the lamplight cast narrow pools of shadow into the dip of his collarbones. He pushes that image out of his mind, though, and flips through the journal a little, thumbing at the thick stock of the paper.

“Brat,” he admonishes Sophia fondly from across a wide ocean. “All that, and you just gave _me_ homework.”

He only gets about halfway through unpacking that night, and ends up just sliding the last trunk of clothes into his bedroom to deal with later. He washes up sloppily, and flops down to the bed with a low groan at finally being able to sleep.

He lies on top of the comforter, still too warm even though he can tell the air is cooling rapidly as night deepens, and curls on his side so he can reach out and pull the shade away from his window just a bit. The only light in the courtyard outside is the silvery cast of the moon, which is hanging wide and fat in the sky above him.

Vernon blinks, and isn’t sure if he’s seeing right, when a dark bird suddenly perches on the very top of the external wall. It’s a raven, he realizes, when it tilts its head to the side and he can see the silhouette of its beak.

He props himself up on one elbow to get a better look. Ravens are nowhere near indigenous to the Southern islands – by all accounts and purposes they shouldn’t even be here, shouldn’t have been able to make the flight across the ocean at all. Instead, they’re known for the thick, heavy flocks they settle into in the West, where they weigh down trees in the mountains and deliver military messages during times of war.

The raven on the wall twitches one wing, shudders a bit against a strong ocean breeze that whistles above the stones that block it from Vernon’s window.

“You don’t belong here,” he mutters to himself, low enough to not be worried about startling the bird with the sound of his voice. “How’d you get this far?” He watches as the raven smooths down its chest with its beak, moves its head to the side once more, and then is suddenly off again into the night.

Blinking, still taking in the sudden shock of something entirely familiar among what has so far been a day of reeling about, trying to feel his way around the edges of a culture mostly unfamiliar to him, Vernon settles back down against his pillows. He turns onto his stomach, props his chin up on one of the pillows, and stares at the gritty pattern of the sandstone wall.

If a Western bird, separated entirely from its flock by the stormy breadth of the Southern sea, can be comfortable enough here to sit on the royal castle then Vernon figures he probably has a shot at teaching _something_ to a Southern prince. That is, he guesses, if he can get him to sit still.


	2. Chapter 2

Vernon’s awake at dawn the next morning, although not entirely by choice. It turns out he’s been given a room on the eastern side of the castle, and so it’s not even 7 in the morning when the sun rises and casts bright light through his window shade. He lies in bed for a few more minutes, mostly out of stubbornness, before he really remembers exactly where he is.

Remembers what he has to do today.

“Shit,” he mumbles into the pillow that he’s burrowed his face in to try to escape the sunrise, and then hauls himself out of bed. If things work here anything like they do back home breakfast will most likely be brought to his rooms, and he should be up and dressed long before then.

He stumbles to the washroom and washes up quickly. They have plumbing like back home, which he hadn’t been sure about before he got there, and so he manages to get clean and mostly dressed when he hears the first knock at the main door to his rooms.

“Come in!” Vernon yells out, still hopping around his bedroom with only one shoe on while he digs through his still-packed trunk to find the other one.

The door slides open to reveal Nayoung, who gives him the same once-over look that he got when he first jumped off the carriage yesterday. Her hair is half down today, and it curls over her shoulders. She looks utterly unimpressed at him.

“Are you ready for your morning meal, sir?” she asks, mouth tilted wryly. “Or should I bring the girls back in a few more minutes?”

He waves a hand at her and finally manages to unearth his other shoe, which he slips on quickly. “No, no, come on in, sorry. Just, uh, getting a late start today, you know how it is.”

“Of course.” She pushes the door open fully, and two younger serving girls trail into the main room. One is carrying a tray that’s covered with a thin screen which she places down on the table, and the other a tray with a teapot and teacup. They buzz around for a moment, pouring tea and removing the screen to reveal several dishes of food, before leaving just as quickly as they came.

Vernon runs a hand through his hair roughly, trying to get it in some semblance of order while the warm air dries it. “Thank you.”

Nayoung nods, hands clasped behind her back. “Of course.” Her mouth twists, and she looks like she’s considering something. “Forgive me, sir, but – you might be a bit warm, in those clothes.”

Vernon looks down at himself. He’s in summer trousers and one of his most lightweight shirts, and hasn’t even done up the top few buttons in a concession to the creeping humidity. “Um. This is kind of the best I have?”

Nayoung raises her eyebrows and her mouth creeps into an almost smile. She herself is wearing similar loose pants to what she was in yesterday, and a draped top that runs sheer down her arms past her shoulders. “If I may, I can request some more suitable Southern-style clothes for you? I’m sure we have funds set aside for you to use, for something as practical as that.”

He huffs and settles down on the seat cushion on front of his food. “That’s probably a good idea, before real summer sets in and you all get to watch as I have heat vapors all over the place.”

She laughs this time, and folds her arms. “Well we can’t have that. I’ll bring you something soon. For now, I’ll leave you to eat, though. Your first commitment is your lessons with the prince later this morning, and I’ll come back to fetch you for those.”

Vernon nods and takes a sip of his tea. “Sounds good. And really, thank you for the clothes.”

Nayoung shakes her head and makes to leave. “Of course, sir. It would be much more expensive to have to invest in smelling salts for you, should you start swooning from heat exhaustion.” She shares a quick smile with him, and then slides the door closed again.

He lets out a breath and sets in on breakfast. It’s simple, more fish and a vegetable broth, and a small dish of fruit that he ends up kind of just picking at, not sure what any of it is. The sun continues to rise outside, and by the time he’s finished the temperature has picked back up, far more hot than it was when he arrived yesterday afternoon.

“Let’s hope that the royal quarters are kept cooler,” Vernon mutters as he gives in and rolls his sleeves up to his elbows. “Or maybe that they have something other than hot tea to drink.” He shakes his head, though, knowing he’s being unnecessarily pessimistic – it’s his first full day in the Southern kingdom but more than that it’s his first day of real work, on his own and in his own position. This isn’t just him shadowing his father in his office, apprenticing for a spot that everyone just assumes he’ll pick up in a few years; this is his own post.

And he’s determined to do well. He gathers his dishes up, stacks them neatly on the tray and refits the screen cover over it, and then takes his cup of cooled tea over to the further room in his quarters.

He had investigated it last night while unpacking and found it to be an office after all. It’s simply furnished, with just a Western-style desk and a few bookshelves stocked with whatever texts his father had left on his last ambassador trip to the South. Vernon had added his own collection to the shelves, and he browses them now, pulling a few titles off that he figures he can use in the lesson today.

They had been clear with what they expected the prince to learn from him, and Vernon would be lying if he said he wasn’t a little intimidated by the scope of everything. They wanted Prince Seungkwan to be versed in Western economics and trade, political and cultural history, literature and art, as well to be as fluent as possible in the Western language. Vernon was well-educated, but even he balked at the amount that they were hoping he would be able to teach in the few months he was slated to stay here.

“You’ll have to study hard,” he mutters, directed at the absent prince as he tucks the books he’s chosen into a shoulder bag that he brought on his trip. “And not make me look bad.”

He wanders around his quarters for the next hour or so, going back and forth between sketching out a rough lesson plan in one of his notebooks and just staring out the huge, open windows in his main room.

In the daylight he can see the courtyard that his windows open up into a bit better; it’s simple and obviously small, only built out a few yards until it hits up against the exterior wall, but there are a few saplings planted that sway in the sea breeze and a simple stone pathway laid out in the grass. A couple of gulls have taken roost on top of the exterior wall, and Vernon looks up at them thoughtfully. He had been almost positive that he had seen that raven last night, but now in the light of the morning it seems even more ridiculous and out of place.

He’s interrupted by another careful knock at the door, and he calls out to open it while scooping a few pens and notebooks haphazardly into his bag. It’s Nayoung again, and she nods at him while he hops over to the door. “Ready for your first lesson?”

“As I’ll ever be, I think,” he replies. His skin is buzzing a little with a mixture of nerves and excitement, and she smiles at him before turning to lead him off. They leave the building the same way they did last night, through the same walkway, and into the building that they ate dinner at. This time they actually go inside, though, and Vernon feels like a wide-eyed kid all over again.

This building looks two-story from the outside but in actuality the ceilings are just twice as high as in his rooms. It’s all much more elaborately decorated, too. Everywhere he turns are mosaics, pressed into the walls and made of some combination of dyed sea glass and ceramic. They wind intricate patterns up the walls, around the sides of huge windows and door frames, and outline indistinct shapes of what he thinks are birds one second and trees the next.

They head further into the building, past open doorways that reveal what look like different meeting rooms, with low tables in the center and portraits of various people he doesn’t recognize hanging on the walls. They don’t pass as many people as he was maybe expecting they would, although he guesses he doesn’t know the patterns of people’s working days here yet.

Vernon follows Nayoung further into the building, and things get even warmer than before. They’re much more enclosed now, in central hallways that don’t have open access to the outside, and he swipes a hand over the sweat already pooling on his brow.

“It kind of seems like the royal family picked the most uncomfortable part of the castle to live in,” he mumbles, and Nayoung casts a look over her shoulder at him.

“It’s tradition,” she replies, “and really, these are just the prince’s quarters. He… has proved to need a bit more central of a location within the castle.”

If Vernon understood anything of what Mingyu told him last night, he can read that as code for ‘if we give the prince a room with windows he’ll just climb out them all the time’. Nayoung doesn’t elaborate, though, and soon enough they fall to a stop in front of a door.

This one is much larger than the one for his room, at least two panels that look like they slide apart in the center to open. The door is inlaid with bronze, with etchings in each panel that Vernon makes a note to inspect closer later, if he ever gets the chance. Instead of knocking Nayoung tucks her hands behind her back and stands in front of the door, with Vernon hovering anxiously behind her shoulder.

“Permission to see his highness, the Prince?” She calls out. There’s a moment of silence, during which Vernon glances down the hallway where they came. Everything still feels eerily empty – the castle in the West was always bustling with movement, and even his family home would have at least one or two servants passing by at this point in the day.

Eventually the doors slide open smoothly. Standing on the other side is a smaller girl, with narrowed eyes and lips pursed in a way that looks like she’s trying to be stern but is fighting back a smile. “Sir Choi?”

Nayoung nods. “I’ve brought him to see the prince for his first lesson.”

The other girl cracks into a grin this time, and slides the doors open a bit more. “He’s been waiting for him, come in.”

Vernon glances at Nayoung, and she just tilts her head towards the open doorway. He hesitates, but then enters first, slipping past the girl who opened the doors and into the room.

It’s hot, is the first thing he notices. The main source of light is a huge skylight in the ceiling, which seems to have a thin screen over it but otherwise lets the sunlight directly into the room. As the central location of the room would suggest there are no other windows, and instead the walls are covered with hanging tapestries in various shades of cream, green, and blue. The flooring in this main room that they’ve entered is different than the stone in his room – it’s some kind of light, rough wood, with several area carpets laid over it.

In the center of the room is a table, similar to the one that they ate dinner at the night before. About six different books are strewn about the table, all open, along with what look like the peels of some kind of orange fruit and a number of pens. Sitting across the table is Prince Seungkwan.

He’s in robes just like the ones he was wearing last night, which Vernon is a little surprised to see. He’d assumed that the royal family had been in more ceremonial attire for dinner, and that the lessons would be more casual. Instead, Seungkwan is in another set of robes, this time a filmy top coat that’s dyed a light blue and a more solid layer underneath, a deep navy that glimmers when he shifts in his seat.

The prince is hunched over a little, with his chin propped up on a hand which in turn is balanced on the table by his elbow. He straightens a bit when Vernon enters, though, and lowers his hands to his lap.

The girl next to Vernon bows a bit. “Sir Choi, from the Western kingdom.” Vernon bows too, unsure of what he should be doing with his body.

“Thank you, Eunwoo.” The prince nods a little, and he has the same kind of unamused set to his mouth that he had last night. “You may leave us, now.”

The handmaid, Eunwoo, bows again, and she and Nayoung both leave. The door slides closed behind Vernon with a kind of finality that strikes nerves in the pit of his stomach, but he ignores them and tries to look confident as he strides forward to approach the table.

“You can sit,” Seungkwan says, and turns to glance down at the book in front of him before slipping a scrap of ribbon in to mark his page and closing it. “I have some questions to ask you.”

“Your highness?” Vernon hedges, and places his book bag to the side while he lowers himself down onto the seat cushion across from the prince. 

Seungkwan folds his hands together and tucks them under his chin before leveling a stare in Vernon’s direction. His hair is damp around his temples – that answers the question Vernon had been mulling over in the back of his mind, then. The prince has to be absolutely boiling in his robes. “This thing. These lessons.” His mouth draws in on itself a bit more, and he’s still eyeing Vernon. “Do you know why they sent you here?”

Vernon shifts, not really expecting this questioning. “Um. I was instructed to give you a comprehensive understanding of the Western kingdom. History, politics, the language. All that.”

The prince’s mouth twists and he moves, leans forward a bit more. “Did they tell you why?”

“Uh. No? Not specifically. I just kind of assumed they wanted you to do more, um, foreign policy, or something. Your highness.”

There’s a beat of silence as Seungkwan peers at Vernon more, and then seems to not find what he was looking for. He huffs deeply and slides down to burrow his face in his arms, down on the table. “You’re no help, are you?”

“Sorry?”

The prince twists his head so he can look up at Vernon with one eye, the rest of his head still buried in the sleeves of his robes. “Why are you here? Why’d they have to ship you all the way across the ocean? There are plenty of scholars here who could’ve taught me all this stuff. They didn’t send anybody from the East, or the North, just you.”

Vernon shifts in his seat. “I… I don’t know, your highness.”

The prince lets out another huffy sigh. “You’re supposed to be basically a genius, right?”

“…I guess?”

“Then why didn’t you ask why you were being sent? You just thought it’d be fun, living in the Southern kingdom for a summer, brushing elbows with royalty and all that?”

“Not really?” This guy - this prince, he can’t always be this ridiculous. There’s no way. “ _Your_ kingdom reached out to mine, we’re kind of doing you a favor with this. I just got picked because I speak the language, I’m not some amazing teacher or anything.”

Seungkwan heaves himself up to sit straight again. He has a red line running down his cheek now, no doubt where his face was pressed against a fold in his sleeves. Vernon feels no desire to point it out to him. “I just don’t get it.” His bottom lip pushes out in a pout, and Vernon has to remind himself that they’re the same age. “I’m doing fine with my studies. I’ve stopped running away from the castle, mostly. I haven’t gotten into real trouble in _ages_. But now I’ve got this Western babysitter,” and he waves a hand in Vernon’s direction, “and it’s like I’m a teenager again.”

“If you’ve stopped running away from things, why were you so late to dinner last night?” Vernon says it before he can really think about it, and he’s immediately mortified. This is his _first day_ here, he’s completely out of line, he’s going to get tossed out over the castle walls –

But then Seungkwan blushes a faint red, and stuffs his hands in his lap as he avoids Vernon’s eyes. “That – nothing. I didn’t run away from the _castle_ , that’s my point. I was here, I was just… doing other stuff.”

“Important royal business?” Vernon’s tone is tipping into teasing now, which is, just, so inappropriate but it’s like he can’t help himself.

Seungkwan rolls his eyes, earrings clinking with the movement. They’re thin silver chains today, with small turquoise gems fixed to the bottom. “You could say that.” He seems to mull something over, then shrugs. “I was at the observation tower.”

Vernon blinks at him. “Observation tower?”

“Yeah.” Seungkwan tilts his head up to look out the skylight at the very highest point of the ceiling. Vernon follows his line of sight, but doesn’t see anything but blue sky and the hazy outline of a cloud. “It’s on the other side of the compound, so you probably haven’t seen it yet. You can see all the way across the city, all the way to the sea and the docks if you’re up there. They used to use it as a look-out for attacking ships but now that everything’s peaceful it’s just kind of for entertainment.”

Seungkwan looks back down, and pokes at the thick book in front of him. Vernon tilts his head a little to be able to read the Southern characters that run down the spine – it’s a scientific manifest about the tidal system, something similar to what Vernon thinks he read in back in university. “You’re studying tides?” he asks, and the prince sniffs at him.

“Studying, hah.” He slaps his palm down on the cover of the book with an air of finality. “I’m basically the local expert in them. I’m not an idiot,” he continues, and the cadence of his words sound like a practiced speech, something he’s had to have said a lot. “I read, I study. I just don’t really like studying pointless stuff, like Western.” Seungkwan glances up at Vernon. “No offense. It’s just, I’m never going to live in the West. I’m Southern, I was born on these islands. I can’t ever live more than an hour from the coast, I’m pretty sure I would just shrivel up and die.”

Vernon grins a little. “Is that why you would run away from the castle? To get to the beach?”

Seungkwan snaps his fingers at him. “So you do have some brains under all that hair.” He continues, ignoring Vernon when he curiously ruffles his bangs a little – he didn’t think he had _that_ much hair, at least not enough to comment on. “I’m a prince of the people, and over half of our economy comes from the sea. What use am I if I’m grounded on land?”

Vernon shrugs, dropping his hand from his hair. “Listen, I feel you, but I kind of have to do my job still, you know?” He ignores the frustrated twist that forms again on the prince’s mouth and barrels on. “I get that it’s annoying, and that it seems pointless, but – look, you could teach me too.”

Seungkwan tilts his head, and the turquoise stones on his earrings brush against the edge of his jaw. “What do you mean?”

“I’m new here, right? I’ve never been outside of the West, and I’ve barely ever been this close to the sea,” and now Vernon feels his enthusiasm ramping up as he leans forward a little over the table. “Sure, I speak Southern, but I barely know anything about the country. We could teach each other. It’d be more like I’m just an exchange student, a visiting scholar or something. Not a babysitter.”

The prince looks at him, eyebrows furrowed. Vernon tries not to squirm under the weight of his considering gaze, tries to look like the adult he’s supposed to be instead of the kid he feels like, excited at the prospect of all of this.

Eventually Seungkwan blinks, and then nods once. “Exchange student. That sounds right.” He nods again, harder this time, and claps his hands together. “Well. If we’re going to get anything done we’re going to need more snacks. And tea, I think, tea would be good.”

He stands up and heads to the door in a rush of robes that swirl past Vernon. The prince must be wearing some kind of perfume, or they wash his robes in something like it, because suddenly the air around Vernon is filled with the faint scent of something warm and sweet.

Vernon blinks, and twists to watch the prince. Seungkwan slides the door open and pokes his head out into the hallway, calls, “Eunwoo?” There’s a shuffling outside the room, and a low voice replies to him indistinctly. “Could you get us more tangerines? And tea, please, the lemongrass kind that Sojeong likes. Thank you.”

He closes the door again and flops back down across from Vernon. He’s pulled a folding fan from somewhere, probably an inner pocket in his robes, but it seems like it appears out of nowhere when he suddenly snaps it open and fans himself. “Where should we start?”

The rest of the morning goes by in a blur. Vernon starts by pulling out the books he brought with him only to get them waved away by the prince, who claims that they’re all too simple.

“I don’t need a _broad_ overview of anything. I’ve taken basic global history classes before, you know,” the prince admonishes him, in the middle of peeling another one of the orange fruits that Eunwoo brought them. His thumb is stained slightly yellow from the pith, and it’s strangely charming. “Tell me something interesting.”

And so Vernon ends up going into a tangent about the nomadic tribes that live in some of the more inhabitable parts of the Western mountain ranges, which leads into Seungkwan drawing a complex but enthusiastic chart on a piece of paper that details the specific and confusing trade agreements between the South and some of the roving pirate crews that still sometimes attack official ships. Vernon teaches him how to conjugate present tense verbs in Western and Seungkwan drags out some Southern musical instrument, a stringed thing with wooden paneling, and laughs at Vernon when he tries to teach him how to play it but all Vernon can manage to coax from it sounds like a dying cat.

It’s a surprise when the door slides open suddenly in the middle of Vernon watching, amused, while Seungkwan reenacts both sides of a pivotal trade agreement between two of the smaller islands from over 500 years ago, complete with dual attempts at poisoning the other party. They both start, and look over to see Eunwoo letting herself into the room.

“Your highness,” she says, and she’s definitely trying to not laugh. “It’s time for your lunch with your sisters.” Vernon blinks, and looks around but there’s no indication of the time anywhere in the room, especially without windows to see the angle of the sun. He hadn’t realized it was that late.

“Right.” Seungkwan deflates a little, dropping his arms from where he’d been pantomiming the head chief of one island threatening to spear the other island’s cook. “Is mother back yet?”

“Not yet,” Eunwoo replies, and heads to the table to sweep up the tangerine peels littered across the surface. “She still has a few more trips to make, she won’t return for another week at least.”

Seungkwan huffs and pulls his fan back out, attempting to dry his bangs from where they had started to stick to his forehead with sweat. “She’s working herself too hard.”

“She’s the queen,” Eunwoo tuts, casting a careful look at Vernon, who scrambles up from the floor. “She has her duties.”

“Still.” Seungkwan flips his fan closed and it disappears back into his sleeve, and then levels his eyes back at Vernon. “Well. Do we have another lesson tomorrow?”

“Pretty sure it’s the same time every day,” Vernon says, glancing at Eunwoo for confirmation. She nods. “So, um. I’ll see you tomorrow. Your highness.”

Seungkwan flaps a hand at him and he and Eunwoo huddle together, discussing something in hushed tones as Vernon gathers his (ignored) books back together and slips out of the room.

Nayoung is standing outside, and she gives him a careful look. “How were lessons?” she asks, but he can tell she wants to ask ‘how was the prince?’.

He shrugs, and adjusts the strap of his book bag on his shoulder as they head back out of the building. “Fine,” he starts, not sure how much to say. “The prince is… very knowledgeable.”

Nayoung twitches a little and glances at him out of the corner of her eye. A small smile is playing on her lips. “Is he?”

Vernon shakes his head, and rakes his sweaty fringe back from his eyes. “And very enthusiastic.”

 

He eats with Mingyu that night, a simple dinner in his rooms. Mingyu laughs loudly when Vernon explains just what they ended up talking about in classes that day with the prince, and ends up sprawled on his back on the floor.

“He totally conned you,” Mingyu gasps, and Vernon glares at him around a mouthful of grilled eel.

“He did not,” he gets out before swallowing. “I’m still teaching him about the West, it’s just more, um… individualized.”

“He got out of the boring stuff, you mean, and gets to spend half the classes talking about whatever he wants to.” Mingyu heaves himself back up with some effort, shaking his head and picking his tea back up. “That’s amazing.”

Vernon rolls his eyes and reaches for more food. “It’s a compromise. At least he’s less likely to skip class now, right?” He shoves some bean sprouts and rice in his mouth, ignoring Mingyu’s incredulous snort. “This is fine for now.”

And the prince doesn’t skip class, not for the next week. Every day Vernon wakes up and eats breakfast, each morning a bit more hot and humid than the last. A few days into his arrival Nayoung makes good on her promise for Southern-style summer clothes and brings him a pile of various outfits. They’re all made of a light, woven fabric, and them plus the pair of reed slippers that she brings as well make him feel just a bit more like he fits in.

He’s still terribly pale, though, and the first time that Seungkwan convinces him to hold their lessons in one of the courtyards he only lasts twenty minutes before the prince sends someone off to bring them a tent for shade.

“You’re like a baby,” the prince remarks, pressing his index finger on the beginnings of a burn on Vernon’s forearm and watching the white outline fill in with red. “It’s not even noon yet, the sun’s still weak. How do any of you survive outside?”

“We don’t get that much sun at home, at least nothing like this,” Vernon replies, and tugs his arm away. His wrist burns a little hotter where Seungkwan was holding it. “Or, when we get sun we’re sensible and keep our skin covered up. We can do that there, it’s never this hot,” he retorts, seeing the disbelieving slant to Seungkwan’s mouth.

“Sounds miserable,” he says, and folds his arms on the surface of the table that they’ve had brought out into the courtyard. Seungkwan’s already pushed his top coat off, letting it pool on the ground behind him, and is sitting in just his inner-robe. Today it’s a spring green, and it makes his skin glow golden. “Don’t you just feel constricted all the time?”

Vernon shrugs. “Not really? Half the time it’s too cold to not be wearing a few layers, anyways. We live closer to the north, in the capital, so our warm season probably feels more like your early spring. You have to be really covered up when it snows, and that’s most of the winter.”

Seungkwan’s eyes sparkle and he leans forward, one sleeve dipping dangerously close to his full tea cup. “Snow, that’s right. Does it really pile up as tall as a grown man?”

Vernon laughs. “Maybe? Usually not where I am, but it can get about this high sometimes,” and he holds a hand about three feet off the ground. Seungkwan immediately dives into a discussion on the weather patterns of blizzards in the mountains, completely derailing Vernon’s earlier attempts to get him to learn the West’s political parties from the past twenty years.

It’s fun, though, more fun than Vernon had expected tutoring the youngest, slightly bratty child of a foreign royal family would be. For all his early attempts to dodge Western education Seungkwan soaks up information like a sponge, at least when it’s something he’s interested in. Half the time they end up having to have lunch brought to their classes, when Seungkwan doesn’t have to eat with his family or someone official, and they continue talking until Eunwoo interrupts them and drags the prince off to his next appointment.

He writes in the journal for Sophia every day, like she ordered him to. He ends up just making a sort of hasty glossary, where he scrawls new Southern words and customs and their definitions, things that he knows she would find interesting.

Nayoung patiently explains the state religion to him one day over breakfast, with its complicated division between the saints that individual families worship and the more country-wide system of pagan beliefs that were as old as the very first of the islands. Vernon records a few of the pagan goddesses and their domains for Sophia, having a little too much fun describing the one who was said to have the head of a lizard that ruled over the volcanic isles to the south.

About a week and a half after his arrival he and Seungkwan are stationed in what has become their normal courtyard, underneath a shade tent. The second the prince’s attendants realized that he was actually going to classes with Vernon they had relaxed the rules on him a bit and Seungkwan had begged to be let outside more often, stating that he was sure he would pass out if he had to spend another hour in the stuffiness of his official quarters.

They’re actually on one of their more productive subjects of the day, with Seungkwan hesitantly sounding out some simple Western sentences that Vernon had written for him to learn, when a harried-looking Eunwoo hurries to their table.

“Your highness,” she huffs, and pushes her hair back from where it’s escaped from the up-do she has it pinned in. “Her majesty has returned, and is here to see you.”

Vernon almost shoots out of his chair, and Seungkwan rises just as quickly. The prince blinks wide-eyed at Eunwoo and flips his top coat back on, fastening it hurriedly. “Of - of course, show her over.”

Eunwoo nods, glances at Vernon, and rushes back into one of the buildings that face into the courtyard. Vernon tugs at his clothes, wishing now that he was back in his Western things if only because they seem more appropriate to be meeting a foreign monarch in.

Seungkwan shoots a quelling look at him. “Calm down,” he hisses, but looks just as anxious from how fastidiously he’s checking that his earrings are still in.

Vernon would reply, but then Eunwoo is back out of the building and standing off to the side. “Her majesty,” she starts, and lifts one hand, palm up. “The Queen of the Southern kingdom, mother of the tides, on the 34th illustrious year of her reign.”

Seungkwan stiffens next to Vernon. There’s a pause, and then a small woman emerges from inside the building. She’s in robes that look closer to what Seungkwan wears than the dress that Jinseol is typically seen in, although they’re fastened closer to her form and trail after her with a longer train than anything Seungkwan’s ever in. She’s just as round-faced as the rest of the royal family, and if Vernon didn’t know any better she would just look like maybe the wife of a higher-up minister in the cabinet.

The queen approaches them and folds her hands to bow. Seungkwan gathers his robes and drops into a kneeling bow, the most traditional thing that Vernon’s seen so far from him, but he guesses that now would be as good a time as any. For his part, Vernon clasps his hands behind him and bows deeply from where he’s standing – perfectly in line with Western traditions, and he figures it’s a good way to indicate his identity to her.

“Oh, stand up,” the queen tuts at Seungkwan and takes his hands when he stands up. Vernon blinks, a little taken aback when the two embrace. Seungkwan has his face hidden in the crook of his mother’s neck and shoulder, and she pats him on the back lightly a few times. “I’ve missed you as well.”

“Mother,” Seungkwan says, and pulls back. His eyes look a little red, but he smiles at her and pats her hair a little. “You have more grays than when I last saw you.”

She hisses at him and slaps his shoulder a little harder. “You don’t say that to your hard-working mother. And you, have you been studying your way to any gray hairs?” She looks over at Vernon. “This is the Western tutor, then?”

“Yes, your majesty,” Vernon replies, and nods again. “Choi Vernon.”

“Perfect.” She releases her son and turns to face him. “I trust you’ve been fully welcomed to our kingdom?” He might imagine it, but he thinks she shoots a quick warning look at the prince.

“Of course, your majesty, everyone has been nothing but helpful in getting me settled in.” He shifts on his feet a little. “The prince has been studying very hard, as well.”

Seungkwan looks at him out of the corner of his eye but the queen just nods. “Very good.” She glances over her shoulder at Eunwoo, who jerks to attention and hurries back into the building.

“I’ve brought someone here to see you,” the queen says to Seungkwan, and then Eunwoo is back with a man following close to her heels.

Vernon watches as Seungkwan’s shoulders stiffen back up from where they had fallen, relaxed, after greeting his mother. He looks back to take in the new stranger. He’s just on the edge of being tall but more than that he’s broad, with solid shoulders and powerful-looking legs under a military uniform that Vernon recognizes as belonging to the South’s navy. Judging from the amount of decorations on his chest, he figures he must be important. He looks young, with shaggy black hair and circles under his eyes but a huge, toothy smile.

“Seungcheol,” Seungkwan says, under his breath, almost as if he doesn’t realize that he’s saying it out loud. The man walks up to stand next to the queen, in front of the prince, and grins at him.

“Your highness,” he says, and his voice is low and warm. “It’s a pleasure to see you again.” He extends a hand and, after a hesitant beat, Seungkwan takes it with one of his. Vernon shifts his weight when the man in the uniform pulls their hands up to press a quick kiss to Seungkwan’s knuckles. He… he hadn’t heard about that particular custom, yet.

“And you,” Seungkwan says, and when his hand is released he pulls it back to tuck in the long sleeves of his overcoat. He glances at Vernon once, then at his mother, then back at the man in the uniform. “Seungcheol, this is Choi Vernon of the Western Kingdom.”

Vernon sketches a quick bow, still not sure what this man’s position is and unsure how to address him. “It’s an honor to meet you.” He straightens. “I’m currently serving as His Highness’s tutor.”

“On Western affairs,” the queen clarifies, and pats Seungcheol’s arm lightly.

Seungkwan nods a little, and then gestures one hand towards Seungcheol. “Vernon – ah, Sir Choi, this is General Choi Seungcheol of the Southern naval forces.” His fingers twitch a little, and he lets his sleeve slip down to cover them. “My fiancé.”


	3. Chapter 3

When Vernon was around 13 there had been a festival throughout the capital to celebrate the betrothal of the youngest royal daughter to the son of one of the largest trading families in the East. He hadn’t really cared much at the time about why there was a festival, instead more interested in the fact that his classes were canceled and he and a few friends were free to roam the decorated streets of the city.

The princess had only been seven or so then, and Sophia was only a bit older, and she had cried for a solid hour that day. He still remembers finding her hidden in the back of their coat closet that night before dinner, bony knees tucked all the way up to her chin and face red and tear-streaked.

“Did the cat scratch you again?” Vernon had asked, pulling some of the heavy coats aside so he could see her better.

Sophia shook her head and then buried her face in her knees, shoulders heaving. “I – I don’t wanna – “, and then she cut off into a wail.

He hesitantly reached in to pat her head a little, not sure what else to do. “What is it, Sof?”

She took in several heaving breaths before she was able to prop her chin back up and look at him. “I don’t wanna get married.”

Vernon paused with his hand on the top of her head. “What? You were just telling me the other day how that kid down the street is going to be your husband.”

Sophia hit him on the shoulder, harder than she should have been able to. “I don’t mean _that_.” She huffed and wiped at her face. “I don’t wanna get married _now_.”

“Sof.” He chanced a tug at one of her braids, and let himself get slapped away. “Who says you have to get married now?”

“The princess is,” she countered. “That’s why we’re having the festival, right? The princess is getting married and she’s even _younger_ than me. If I get married I have to leave, and go move somewhere awful, and I _just_ got my kitten, what if I can’t bring her with me?”

Vernon snorted. “That’s not how it works, you know. The princess isn’t getting _married_ any time soon, this is all just because she’s betrothed now.” She blinked at him a little, and he searched his mind for an easier way to say it. “She just promised that she would marry this guy. But they don’t have to get married yet, they’re still just kids. It’s just a promise that they _will_ get married, one day.”

He held out a pinky to her, and waited for her to link it with hers. “Like this, right? So they made a promise now, but they still get to grow up and live with their family and stuff.”

Sofia had sniffed and wriggled her pinky away from his. “Am I betrothed?” She sounds out the word, stumbling only a little.

“Nah,” he assured her. “Only the really fancy people get betrothed. Sometimes royalty have so much going on that they don’t have time to find someone to marry on their own,” he continues, trying to make this easier to understand. “For people like us, though, we get to decide who to marry for ourselves.” For the most part, he thought, but didn’t mention it. “So you get to stay here with your kitten, and go to school and stuff like that, and then one day you’ll fall in love and maybe then you can promise to marry him.”

Sofia was silent for a bit, and then nodded a little. “Ok. If you’re sure.”

“I’m sure.” Vernon scooted out of the closet a bit, and glanced back at her. “Wanna stay in here for a little longer, or are you good?”

She shook her head, braids swinging on her shoulders. “Can we go see if the cook is making anything special for the festival?”

“Sure, Sof,” he said, and let her grab his hand so he could pull her out of the closet.

Vernon thinks about the princess now, and how tiny she had looked in her ruffled Western style dress when he had caught a glimpse of her at the hand-promising ceremony. She had been standing next to the Eastern boy, himself only 10 and looking more like a half-grown weed than someone who would be a princess’s husband one day. They both had refused to look at each other.

He wonders, somewhere in the back of his mind, how old Prince Seungkwan had been when he was betrothed to this man.

The thought makes him blink and shift back to focus on what’s happening in front of him. The queen still has a hand placed lightly on General Seungcheol’s arm, and the general himself is grinning a little bashfully at the prince. Neither of them are looking in Vernon’s direction, and he suddenly feels keenly the fact that maybe he shouldn’t be here for this.

He chances a look over their shoulder at Eunwoo, and she just kind of widens her eyes and shrugs at him. No luck there, then.

“What – what are you doing here?” The prince sounds shaken, and he tucks his hands into his sleeves in front of him. “I thought you were still stationed further south.”

“I was,” Seungcheol says, and shares a quick look with the queen. “Her majesty came to inspect the base, and then I accompanied her on her return to the capital.”

“He’s done very well for himself at the base,” the queen assures her son, ignoring Seungcheol’s embarrassed shake of his head. “You really should have visited sometime, Seungkwan.”

“I… I had school,” the prince mumbles.

“Nevertheless,” the queen says, and glances back at Eunwoo. “Could we have some tea brought for the general? We’ll just take it out here,” and she gestures to the low table that Vernon had brought out for their lessons. “It looks like the perfect spot for this conversation.”

“Of course, your majesty,” Eunwoo demurs, and scampers back into the building behind her.

Vernon wishes he could follow her, but Seungkwan immediately pins him with a pointed look and jerks his head towards the table. “Sir Choi, would you mind clearing the table for my mother?”

“Um, no, of course I can,” he stutters out, and kneels to sweep the notebooks they had been working with into his notepad. Seungkwan nods, but they’ve spent enough time together by this point that Vernon can see the edges of something panicked in his expression.

The queen waits for him to get the table clear before lowering herself gracefully to kneel at one of the cushions. They’ve stationed themselves on a cobblestone platform in the center of the courtyard, with the table brought out from inside along with two seat cushions and the shade cover.

Vernon stands back up, bag clutched tight to his chest, and looks around awkwardly. The general glances at him and grins, his mouth slanting up to one side in a manner that makes him look even younger. “Better let the royalty have a seat first, huh?”

Vernon breathes out something like a laugh. “Of course.”

He sees Seungkwan shoot him an annoyed look before he shifts the seat cushion that Vernon had been using so that it’s on the side catty-corner from his mother’s spot, and then drops to sit on it.

“What have you two been doing today, then?” The queen asks, and reaches to take Seungkwan’s hand between hers.

“Um,” Seungkwan starts, and glances unsure at Vernon. “Western language lessons. Nothing, uh, really complicated yet, though.”

The queen hums. “That’s good you’re getting a start on that from the beginning. And the rest of it?”

“The rest of it?” The prince blinks at her, and his pupils are moving side to side a little like he’s thinking hard about the past few days. “Just, some history lessons. I can tell you about them later, mother,” he continues, and gestures politely towards the general and Vernon. “We should be welcoming Seungcheol properly.”

The queen tuts, and it reminds Vernon so strongly of his own mother that he feels a little dizzy with it. “He’s a soldier, dear, he’s used to standing. Your handmaid will be bringing more seats in just a second.”

As if overhearing the conversation Eunwoo is back, with two plush cushions and another servant trailing behind her with a tray of tea. “Your majesty,” she says, sounding disappointed. “I was bringing nicer seats for you and his highness, you should have waited.”

“I’ve been on a boat for the past three weeks,” the queen retorts, and pats the back of the prince’s hand where she’s still holding it. “All I need is a place to sit and my son to talk to. These gentlemen will appreciate the seats much more than I would.” She nods towards Vernon and the general, who both hesitantly lower themselves to sit.

Vernon ends up on the other side of the queen, across from Seungkwan and next to the general. He nods his thanks to Eunwoo when she places a tea cup in front of him and she raises an incredulous eyebrow towards him, her back to the queen.

“As happy as I am to see you,” the prince hedges, and twitches his fingers into a loose grip around his cup when his mother releases him. “I – you understand that I’m a little surprised, right?”

Seungcheol levels another grin at the queen and lifts his cup to his mouth. “I told you I should have written ahead, your majesty.”

She shakes her head firmly. “We might as well be family; you should always be happy to see family.”

“I am happy to see him,” Seungkwan protests, “I just don’t understand.” He shoots an apologetic look towards the general, who shrugs. “I haven’t seen Seungcheol in almost, what, four years now? He could have visited at any time, so why the reunion now?”

“Not very romantic, huh?” the general jokes. He holds his hands up in surrender when the prince pouts at him. “Sorry, sorry, I know. I fully blame your mother, I wanted to warn you before I got here.”

Seungkwan shakes his head but he’s smiling now too. “You can’t really go against her, no matter how much you try.” He winces back when the queen pinches his ear. “But really, what’s the occasion?”

Vernon watches, uneasy, as the general and the queen share a look. Seungkwan looks just as lost, brow furrowed now. “What?”

The queen shifts, sips her tea, then places it back down and looks right at her son. “I’m beginning to think it may be time, soon, for the wedding.”

The air feels thin in the courtyard all of a sudden, and more than any time before Vernon _really_ thinks that he shouldn’t be here for this. Seungkwan looks completely shocked, mouth almost open and grip loosened on his cup (which, thankfully, is still placed on the table).

Seungcheol shifts in his seat a little, the medals on his chest clinking. “Seungkwan – “

“What?” The prince’s gaze is still locked on his mother. “What, where did this come from?” His tone steadies, and dips towards anger. “We haven’t discussed this at _all_. How soon you do mean?”

“General Seungcheol is being reassigned,” the queen says, tone clipped. “We’re hoping permanently, or at least for the foreseeable future. It was fine when he was still within the kingdom, only a few days’ trip away, but soon he’ll be positioned in the West – “

“ _What?_ ”

“And,” she continues, gaze stern, “that’s entirely too far for you two to be from each other, and you’re 22, Seungkwan. Jinseol was married by now, when she was your age.”

“She’s the _crown princess_ , she had to be.”

“Well you certainly can’t live with him unmarried,” the queen says, and then bulldozes right over Seungkwan’s incredulous squawk. “I’ve been thinking an autumn wedding may be nice, as long as the moon cycle is right for it, and then you both can be off to his new position by the winter solstice. Why did you think I had a Western tutor sent over for you? You have the summer to brush up on these things.”

Oh no, Vernon thinks, frozen in his seat. Please don’t bring me into this.

Seungkwan’s really gaping now, and he turns to look at Vernon. He looks betrayed. “So, what? I’m moving to the West by the end of the year? You’re just shipping me off?” He twists back to face his mother. “Is this because of the trouble I’ve gotten into? Because I’ve been way better lately, I haven’t snuck out of the castle in _months_ , didn’t Jinseol tell you that?”

“This isn’t a punishment.” The queen purses her lips, a strikingly familiar expression to her children. “This is just how it is. Seungcheol has to go preside over our Western base, and you’re his betrothed. You’ll work with foreign affairs with us and our Western allies. This is good, Seungkwan,” she insists now. “You’ll have your own position. You can actually use all of those brains for something good, not just for tinkering on that sailboat of yours.”

Seungkwan huffs, sounding insulted. “Tinkering. Mother – “

“This is final, Seungkwan.” She levies one more look at her son. “These are our duties as the royal family. We do what’s best for this kingdom, and you’re better suited alongside your intended than separated. You won’t be locked up in a castle, you’ll be doing work. Isn’t that what you’ve wanted?”

Seungkwan sits, silent, for a moment. A breeze blows by the table, ruffling their hair and sending a forgotten piece of loose-leaf paper billowing across the courtyard to be hurriedly grabbed by a waiting servant. The queen takes another sip of her tea, and the general to Vernon’s left says nothing.

Finally, the prince grits his teeth and looks back over at his mother. “Well. Since we have everything figured out, then, may I be excused?” He glances over at Eunwoo, who’s still standing back. “I believe I may have an appointment scheduled soon, and I really shouldn’t be late to it.”

He shifts, then seems to think better of it and places his hands on the table in front of him to bows quickly. “Welcome home, mother.” She looks resigned but nods back, and settles further onto her heels.

Seungcheol moves to stand up too. “Let me accompany you, Seungkwan, we should – “

“No, actually, I believe I’m capable of walking on my own,” the prince interrupts him, and springs up from his seat. “Eunwoo can catch me, should my delicate constitution fail and I swoon on the way to the finance offices.”

Vernon winces at the prince’s harsh tone and watches him flounce off, stopping to hiss something in his handmaid’s ear before the two of them leave through one of the branching walkways.

The queen sighs breezily and pushes her tea cup away from her. “Well. That went better than I was expecting.”

 

When Vernon heads to the prince’s rooms the next day for their lesson he’s not really sure why he’s surprised to find him absent. Eunwoo shrugs at him from her perch next to the table in the main room, where she’s embroidering something onto the hem of a set of robes.

“He wasn’t here when I came to bring him breakfast,” she says as Vernon sets his books down and sits next to her. “And his bed was made, which either means he’s gotten much better at being an adult and cleaning up after himself, or he didn’t sleep here last night.”

Vernon sighs and casts a glance around the room. “Is this what he used to be like?”

She hums thoughtfully and picks at a stich. “Sort of. He definitely snuck out a lot, but he usually restricted that to during the day.” He watches as she carefully finishes what he can see now to be a section of little white flowers dusting the hem of the robe, which is a charcoal grey. “You can’t be shocked about this, though.”

“No, I kind of figured this would happen.” He plays with the strap of his book bag absently while looking at the tapestry opposite from him. It’s the sort of languid, almost lazy illustration that was popular in the South about 100 years ago, Seungkwan had explained to him, and had pointed out the particularly important images on it.

One scene, which he eyes now, depicts the goddess of safe travels for sailors, standing high on a salt pillar where she keeps watch for incoming storm fronts. She’s wrapped in billowing robes that make her form almost cloud-like, and Vernon feels something click in the back of his mind when he follows the lines of the embroidery.

“Eunwoo,” he asks, “could you tell me how to get to the observation tower?”

 It is on the complete opposite side of the compound, it turns out, and Vernon ends up having to trace a circuitous path of outer walkways and quick, indoor short-cuts to get there without needing to pass through more populated areas of the castle. He’s still new enough to the castle that not many people know who he is, and he’s honestly rather avoid being questioned for why he’s skulking around looking lost.

Eventually he manages to find the entrance to the tower, and he takes a second to tip his head back just to look up, and up. And up. The tower is huge, certainly the tallest thing he’s seen throughout the entire city, or at least the sections that he’s been through so far. It’s not made of the same sandy material that most of the compound is but instead is built of rough grey blocks of stone, which he guesses is a testament to its military past.

When he walks in the temperature immediately drops, and he lets out a surprised noise of relief. One hand against the stone wall, he carefully begins his way up the tower. Instead of stairs it has a curved, smooth ramp that spirals up to the top. It’s easier to climb but also kind of dizzying, and he has to take a few moments to stop and get his grounding again during the trip.

Finally, he reaches a flat point at the very top of the tower. It’s surrounded by open windows, which are evenly distributed for cannon fire, with a low ceiling. It’s very empty.

Vernon stops to catch his breath and feels a little bit like he had the ground swept out from under him. For some reason, he had been _so_ sure that the prince would be here.

“Hey.” He startles, and whips around. He hadn’t noticed it at first but there’s a ladder at the far wall, and it leads up to a now-open hatch in the ceiling. A hand dips down through the opening and flaps roughly in his direction. “I can hear you panting down there, might as well come up.” It’s muffled and tight with frustration, but it’s Seungkwan’s voice.

Vernon approaches the ladder hesitantly, and looks up at the open hatch as he grips the closest rung. He can see the sky through the opening, and when he finally gets the guts to heave himself up and sling an arm out to catch himself on the side of the hatch the sea breeze is immediately whipping at his hair.

He carefully pulls himself up to kneel on the side of the opening, eyes stuck on the view. He’s emerged onto the very top of the tower, which will be terrifying when he gives himself more time to think that over, but right now it’s just amazing.

He’s on a thin walking path built around the tip of the tower, and although there’s a thin fence that runs around the edge it’s still a dizzying drop. He can see straight out of the castle compound and over the city, out past to the points of the clusters of sailboats and the hulking bodies of the larger trading ships, and then further out over the ocean until it comes to a halt at the horizon line.

Uneasy, Vernon turns to look at Seungkwan. The prince is seated on the floor, leaning against the wall that forms the tip of the tower with his arms tucked around his knees. His hair is a mess from the strength of the ocean wind up this high. For the first time in Vernon’s experience he’s not in his usual set of robes; instead, he’s wearing loose trousers and a plain shirt, half-laced at his collarbones, and no jewelry.

He looks miserable.

“Hi,” Vernon tries, and then again a little louder when he realizes that the wind is whipping his words away from him. He crawls a little closer to mirror Seungkwan’s position against the wall, still a few feet away. “I was wondering if you’d be here.”

The prince’s shoulders hunch against a laugh and he turns his head to eye Vernon carefully. “Surprise.” He moves, then, and stretches his legs out in front of himself. He has just enough room to do it; the walkway isn’t that wide. “You found me.”

They just sit for a second, looking out at the view. Then: “This is bullshit.”

Vernon glances over at the prince to find him glaring out at the ocean. “Is it?”

“It completely is.” Seungkwan rakes a hand through his hair, pushing it away from his face only to have it flop back down when the breeze shifts. The circles under his eyes are deep, and Vernon idly wonders if he slept at all last night. “You get that, right?”

Vernon shrugs, not really sure how to respond, but the gesture just makes Seungkwan huff at him.

“It’s nothing against Seungcheol,” Seungkwan says, and crosses his arms in front of him. “He’s fine, he’s probably the nicest guy I’ve ever met. I was alright with it when we were betrothed. He was probably one of the better options, you know? He’s only a few years older than me and he’s from the South.”

He shifts, and pulls one leg back up so he can hook a hand around his ankle. “It was all supposed to be one of the simpler marriage links, just arranged because he was an important military figure from a long line of important military figures, and I’m just the third son. We weren’t even officially promised to each other until he was 18, when he got an officer position. I was, like, 15, so I was off at boarding school then.”

Vernon makes a low, considering noise. “So it didn’t feel that real?”

Seungkwan nods faintly, eyes still unfocused but directed out towards the waves. “I guess. We wrote to each other sometimes, just to get to know each other, and he came to my graduation ceremonies and everything, but then he got stationed further south and I didn’t see him again.” His gaze sharpens a little. “Until now, I guess.”

A few seagulls fly by, squawking and banking away from the tower, maybe because they found their usual spot already taken by two humans. “And that’s why no one told you why you were getting a Western-focused tutor, then,” Vernon ventures, holding one hand up to shield his eyes as the sun tilts further towards them.

Seungkwan actually barks out a laugh at that. “Yeah, apparently. Just ship the kid prince off to the middle of some frozen wasteland, that’ll stop him from getting into trouble.” He rolls his eyes at Vernon before he can say anything. “I _know_ , it’s not _always_ snowy, but it’s nothing like it is here, right?”

He grins a little wryly at the prince, squinting at him against the sun. “It’s got some similarities. We’re just a lot more sensible; for example, we usually don’t take to hanging out on elevated surfaces with only minor safety measures taken.” Vernon tilts his head towards the fence that wraps around the walking path, and how it definitely looks a little too rusty to be trusted.

The prince shoves him, but he’s smiling a little now too. “Yeah, us and our advanced architecture, we’re such barbarians.”

“Ha, yeah,” Vernon catches himself on the floor before he can fall further to the side. “That’s you guys. All crazy architecture and, like, fifty different kinds of boats.”

Seungkwan snorts very inelegantly. “We have water on every side of us, boats are very important.”

“They’re awful, though,” Vernon says, mostly to get a rise out of the prince – it’s something he’s started to grow fond of. Seungkwan gets all pouty and insulted whenever Vernon dares question the Southern way of things. He kind of looks like Sofia’s cat when he sits on the shelf in their father’s office and stares at the rest of them in disdain.

He gets the desired response – Seungkwan puffs up and slaps out at his arm again. “Say that again! What do you mean, awful?”

“I get sick on boats,” he says, tipping his head back a little to grin wider at the prince. “What’s the good of a mode of transportation if you have to spend the whole time ill?”

“Oh,” Seungkwan replies, “of course, your weak Western constitution can’t take it.” He sniffs, and casts a look out over the city, towards the docks. “That’s just those big crafts that you all have to take when you cross the sea. I bet you’re better on a proper thing, with a sail.”

“Never been on one.”

The prince swivels to gape at him. “You’re kidding.”

“Nope.” Vernon shifts to face him straight-on and leans back on his hands. “I’ve only been on the ocean to travel, never just to sail or fish or anything.”

“You’ve never even _fished?_ ” If Vernon’s mom was here she would say that Seungkwan could be catching flies with his mouth right now. “I’m a _prince_ , and I’ve fished. What’s wrong with your family, raising their son like this?”

“We mostly hunt,” Vernon says, now feeling like he has to defend his manhood for some reason. “I’ve been going with my dad on hunting trips since I was twelve.”

“How brutish,” the prince retorts, but he’s leaning forward now like he does in their lessons when he’s landed on something really, really fascinating. “We should go fishing.”

“What? When?”

“Now.” Seungkwan’s eyes really light up, and a full smile is curling at the edges of his mouth. “Now, let’s go now! I’m already too furious at everything to be able to settle down for lessons, and now that I know I’m going to get sent off to remedial marital education in just a matter of months I have a lot of wasted trouble-making time to make up for.”

He scrambles to get his feet underneath him and crawls over Vernon’s legs to get to the hatch back down to the tower. Vernon tries very hard to keep still, but it’s more difficult than he thought when you have a prince in your lap who’s suddenly buzzing with energy. He ends up having to awkwardly grab at Seungkwan’s hips to steady him when he almost loses his balance and tips towards the rusted fence.

“They’ll be even more angry at you if you manage to get yourself killed falling off this thing,” he says, but Seungkwan just scoffs.

“I’ve been coming up here since I was ten, and I haven’t died yet.” The prince manages to get to the hatch and swings his legs down through it before looking back up at Vernon. “Are you coming?”

Somehow, a voice tucked deep in the back of Vernon’s mind remarks, the prince looks more radiant than ever up here. This is nothing like the warm glow of him in full regalia under the light of gold-tinted lanterns – this is the prince, in what probably passes for him as his rattiest clothes, with windswept hair and a determined glint in his eye. The sun is high in the sky now – it’s almost noon – and the bright beam of it threads shades of amber and red through the prince’s hair. Somehow, the sight sends something swooping in Vernon’s stomach, and he reflexively tightens his grip on the walkway flooring before nodding.

“Let’s go.”

 

The thing about having a walled castle, Vernon realizes, is that the people really don’t get a glimpse at their royal family outside of official occasions. Seungkwan explains some of this in hushed tones as they creep down a side alley away from the servant’s entrance that they had slipped out of.

“Our last public appearance was maybe half a year ago,” he says, and shoots a sunny grin at an older woman who’s bent over her knitting, sitting in a chair in front of her shop. “And I always get pushed to the back for those type of things, so most people don’t recognize me if I’m not with Jinseol and in my usual robes.”

“It helps that you’re the youngest, probably,” Vernon says, slowing to peer at the window for a store that seems to be selling nothing but brilliant, woven rugs.

“You always bring that up,” Seungkwan whines, but pauses next to him. “I’m still pretty important.”

Vernon shoots a slanted grin at him before turning back to the window. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to bruise your royal ego.” He winces when all he gets for that is a sharp pinch to the skin just above his elbow and he rubs at it. “Definitely the youngest, geez, you’re a brat.”

The prince laughs and turns to continue down the street, leaving Vernon to trot to catch back up. “I _had_ to be, you didn’t grow up with the sisters that I did. Jinseol’s fine when she’s being all queen-ly, but try being there when she was 16 and had to go on a state visit by herself for the first time. She cried before she left, and then punched me for laughing at her, and then _I_ cried.”

Seungkwan shoves his hands in the pockets of his trousers and tips his head back to look up at the clouds. “Sojeong was always the peacekeeper, which makes sense. You haven’t met her yet, right?”

“I don’t think so?” They emerge from the back alley into a slightly broader, busier street, and Seungkwan takes a right turn that feels practiced. “She’s the one who’s going into religious stuff, right?”

Seungkwan nods. “Yeah. She’s apprenticing for one of the heads of the state church right now.”

“That’s the one with all the, uh,” Vernon makes an indistinct wiggly motion with his fingers, “nature and goddesses and stuff, right?”

The prince snorts. “Yeah, all that stuff. It’s a very respected position to be going into. Not many people in the royal family have done it, but Sojeong just always had the mentality for it. You’ll probably meet her in a little while, at the lunar festival.”

“When’s that?”

“Um,” they take a quick turn down another street, and Seungkwan taps a finger against his jaw. “In a few weeks? I think? I’m sure they’ve started preparations for it already, but they never tell me because I used to always bother the cooks.”

Vernon laughs. “You’re a terror.” They continue down the street, and he lets himself really gawk like he hasn’t had the chance to yet this whole trip. It’s early afternoon and so things are picking up for lunch, with street vendors hawking things to them as they walk by. Seungkwan ends up dragging him over to one particular stall and buying them both sticks of grilled eel, brushed with a vinegary sauce that earns Vernon a slap on the arm because he can’t help but lick his fingers afterwards.

They’re nearing the dockside district when he sees it. There have been seagulls everywhere on their walk, landing near people with food and flying lower than Vernon had been expecting at first, but then all of a sudden there’s a black shape among them. A raven – _the_ raven, Vernon’s mind insists, although there’s no way he could know – darts in between the gulls, wings sharp and distinct against the colors of the street.

Before he realizes he’s doing it Vernon grabs the prince’s wrist and tugs him forward, almost at a jog, following the raven.

“What – are you crazy, what, we’re not going that way,” the prince sputters, but quickens his pace to keep up.

“I know, sorry, I just – I have something I want to find out,” Vernon says, and then speeds up into a run.

The raven isn’t moving that quickly but it changes directions with no warning in a way that makes the two of them skid on their heels before they reorient themselves. At some point Seungkwan shifts to thread his fingers between Vernon’s, making things easier as they really take off down the street.

“You _are_ crazy,” the prince laughs out at one point, breathless, as they push past a crowd gathered outside of a medical clinic.

Vernon grins but doesn’t respond, too focused on following the sleek shape of the raven with his eyes as they barrel down the street. Eventually, the raven flits to a stop and settles on a streetlight, and the two of them draw to a halt to look up at it.

“Well,” Seungkwan says, blinking against the sun. “We got it. What _is_ that?”

“It’s a Western raven,” Vernon replies, a little unsure what to do at this point. “I… I saw it, I think, the first night I was here. It was so strange, because it really shouldn’t be here. They’re indigenous in certain places on the mainland but they wouldn’t be able to make the flight across the ocean, unless – “

“Unless someone brought it across?” A voice interrupts him, and Vernon jerks. He drops Seungkwan’s hand like it burned him (he hadn’t even noticed he was still holding it) and looks down at the man who’s leaning half-out of the door of the store that they’ve accidentally stopped in front of.

He’s thin, Vernon sees when he props his shoulder against the doorframe in a way that draws attention to the boniness of his joints. He has dusty brown hair and something carefully catlike about the way the edges of his mouth curl up. He’s wearing a loose Southern shirt but his trousers are cuffed distinctively Western-style.

Seungkwan collects his words first. “Is that your bird?”

The man laughs and casts a fond look up at the raven, who has its head under a wing to ruffle at the feathers. “As much as you can own something that flies, I suppose so.” He levels his gaze back at the two of them. “You know a lot about ravens?”

“I’m, um, I’m from the West,” Vernon starts. “I’ve lived there all my life.”

The man blinks. “Really?” He says this in Western, and the consonants are so familiar that Vernon is horrified to suddenly feel like crying. “I thought I knew all the Western immigrants in the city.”

“I’m not an immigrant,” Vernon says, “I’m, um, I’m working for the ambassador to the South. I’m only here for the summer.”  He ignores the pointed look Seungkwan is giving him, knowing that their conversation has gone way over the basic vocabulary that the prince has cobbled together. “I’m Vernon Choi, it’s nice to meet you.”

“Joshua Hong,” the man says, and smiles. “It’s always good to have something familiar, right?”

“Yeah,” Vernon breathes out, “it is.” Finally, he gives in to the prince’s prodding and elbows him back. “This is, um,” and pauses, looking at Seungkwan.

There’s only a beat of silence before Joshua cuts in. “I think you two may want to come in?” he suggests, lips curling further into a smirk. “We wouldn’t want to cause a riot, with a celebrity this far down in the city.” He switches back into Southern for all of this, and Seungkwan deflates in relief.

“That would be great,” Vernon says, abashed, and the two of them duck into the store after Joshua. They both cough almost immediately, taken aback by the sudden press of dusty air.

“Sorry,” Joshua laughs, sounding a little embarrassed, leans against the counter that’s stationed on the back wall of the store. “It’s a little musty in here.”

Vernon looks around, wide-eyed. “You know there’s a city library, right?” The shelves are absolutely crammed with books, and almost every flat surface has others propped on it.

Seungkwan makes a startled noise and clings to Vernon’s side when the raven suddenly banks in through the doorway. It perches on the back of a chair behind the counter, and Joshua shoots it a tired look. “I’ve been to the library many times,” he says, “but even their collections have limits. I’m kind of a… specialist.”

“That’s for sure,” the prince says, carefully lifting one of the massive books on the table closest to him to scan the cover. “I think we have a copy of this but they don’t let me touch it, it’s so old.”

“That’s not an original print, sadly,” Joshua says, and he really does sound broken-hearted about it. “Most of the text is the same, though, so it works for my purposes.”

“What do you do? This can’t just be a normal bookshop,” Vernon says, spinning slowly to take in the whole store.

Joshua laughs a little. “Mostly I collect rare books. I moved to the South a few years ago because they have a fascinating history of print language development,” he says, tracing the cover of one of the books on the counter. “Nothing that interesting to most people, I’m afraid. I’m just a scholar.”

Seungkwan makes a surprised noise from where he’s moved to inspect one of the shelves. “I haven’t even _heard_ of some of these, how’d you get them?”

“You’d be surprised what books some old families have sitting in their offices that they never look at,” Joshua says, moving to see what Seungkwan’s looking at. He taps one of the books on the shelf. “This one I was given by a grandmother who lives down in the dock district. Her husband had it passed down from his side of the family, but they had no children and when he died she didn’t know what to do with it.” He shifts back, and looks quietly proud. “You have a very generous people, your highness.”

Vernon watches Seungkwan turn carefully towards Joshua, the tips of his ears beginning to go red. “You did recognize me, then?”

Joshua laughs gently. “I’m a scholar; it’s my business to be educated on everything about the land that I’m studying.” He tips his head a little, looking carefully at the prince. “If I may, though, you’re welcome here any time. I understand if the castle may get a little… tiring, at times.”

Looking slightly stunned, Seungkwan laughs. “Of course.” He tips his head back to stare up at the shelves, eyes wide. “I think I could spend weeks here without really making a dent.”

“Well,” Joshua steps back towards the counter, and runs a quick finger over the raven’s head and down its beak, where it snaps out at his fingers but doesn’t seem too interested in actually catching any of them. “You’re certainly welcome to try.”

Vernon ends up perched on a stool that Joshua drags out of a back room, the two of them watching as the prince carefully hauls a few thick books to a table that he’s managed to clear a space at. He wrings his hands a little, and turns back to the other man. “Thank you, um, for not – not raising a fuss, I guess.” He says lowly, in Western.

Joshua grins. “It’s no problem. He’s not my prince,” he continues, and picks up a pen and notebook to scrawl something on a sheet of paper, “but I certainly want to look out for him regardless. I’m sure you understand that feeling.”

“Yeah,” Vernon replies, eyes skimming over the way that Seungkwan’s eyebrows furrow in concentration as he tries to read what looks to him to be incomprehensible old Southern characters. “I do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Observation tower design shamelessly inspired by the Rundetårn in Copenhagen, Denmark.


	4. Chapter 4

“I’m pretty sure this isn’t even Southern anymore.”

“That’s because you’ve never had to read the classics, it’s just the calligraphy. If you kind of squint like this it’s easier to read.”

“Isn’t this just where the ink got wet and smudged? This book looks like it’s been through a few hurricanes.”

Seungkwan thwaps Vernon on the arm with his closed fan but flips the page in the book anyways, eyes still focused on the characters. “Don’t be so disrespectful, I’m sure Joshua got this from some lovely old fishing couple.”

“Actually,” Joshua says, and takes a seat across the low table from them, “I think that one I bought from a bartender in a smaller city the next island over. He was using it to stabilize a stool that had one short leg.”

Seungkwan ignores him when Vernon laughs out loud at that, and instead traces the lines of text with one finger as he reads them. “I can’t believe you just _found_ some of these things. How long have you been at this?”

Joshua hums and leans his chin against one hand, thinking. “I didn’t really start in on my Southern collection until maybe five years ago? Before that I was living in the East for a while, apprenticing for an archivist at one of their universities.”

“When did you move here?” Vernon asks, leaning back enough in his chair that the prince shoots him a look, no doubt for his incivility.

“About three years ago this fall,” Joshua replies. “I was mostly collecting things that I could find in the East then, but eventually all of those sources dried up and I just had to pack up and head down here.”

“That’s amazing,” Vernon says, watching as the raven grooms itself from its perch on the shelf behind Josh. “Just, being able to travel like that.”

Joshua tilts his head a bit, considering. “It is. I mean, I never liked being in one place, you know? Even now, I’ve been in the South long enough that I’m wondering if it might be time to leave again.”

The prince makes a startled noise and looks up sharply from the book. “You can’t!” His shoulders slump a bit. “I barely even started reading everything.”

Joshua laughs. “I’m not about to pack up and disappear anytime soon, don’t worry about that. It’s just a thought.” He crosses his arms and looks out into his shop, eyes distant. “I’ve been wondering if it might be time to go back West.”

“Well,” Seungkwan says, and flips a page again with a determined set to his jaw, “you have to let me at least get through your navigational history things, before you go sailing off again.”

Ever since they had first found Joshua’s shop, Vernon and the prince had been back almost every single day. The guards had started turning a blind eye to them sneaking out of the back exits to the castle compound during their lesson times, which made Vernon suspect that the queen had told them to loosen their hold on the prince slightly. Give him his last chance for freedom before he got moved out.

Seungkwan had been going through the books at a voracious pace. Joshua and Vernon had taken up the habit of just sitting back and talking lowly while the prince read, occasionally interrupted for him to exclaim something loudly at Joshua before going back to the books. At this point, a week after their first trip into the city, Vernon still hasn’t been fishing, but he can’t find it in himself to mind.

“Don’t you both have to head back soon?” Joshua asks now, glancing at his pocket watch that’s been sitting on the top of an abandoned volume to the side of the table.

Vernon glances at the time too and grimaces, ready for Seungkwan to put up a fight. “Yeah. We should be getting you back to the castle,” he tells the prince, but is surprised when he just nods and shuts the book without a fuss.

“Thanks, again,” Seungkwan says, carefully stacking the books back up and handing them to Joshua to reshelve. “You seriously have some treasures here.”

Joshua laughs, flushing a little, and clutches the books to his chest. “That’s very kind of you, your highness.”

“I told you not to call me that,” Seungkwan mutters, but just reaches out to grab Vernon’s arm. “C’mon, let’s go.”

The sun is high above them when they emerge out into the street that Joshua’s shop is seated on. They’ve begun approaching the true height of the summer, now, and Vernon’s just accepted that he’ll be constantly twinging with sunburn at the tops of his shoulders and the high planes of his cheeks. The prince, on the other hand, has adapted to it as smoothly as he does anything, and he can already see his hair lightening from the time they’ve spent outside and in the courtyards.

“You seem like you’re in a good mood,” Vernon says lowly as they head back towards the castle, taking a direct route instead of the winding, procrastinating back ways they do most days. “Not dreading going back to the castle today?”

Seungkwan stretches his arms high above his head, weaving a little accidentally so his hip bumps up against Vernon’s before he can redirect his path. “Nah. I don’t have any official meetings, just a robe fitting.” His eyes are lit up with something mischievous when he looks over at Vernon. “Do you have anything to wear to the lunar celebration? It’s coming up, you know.”

“Um,” he hedges, glancing away as they hike up an uphill street that’s lined with small dwellings. “What’s the dress code, exactly?”

The prince laughs brightly. “It’s a festival, and it’s one of the only times we have commoners in the castle grounds, so people usually go all out. I’ll be surprised if Jinseol can even walk the day of - she’ll be in like twenty pounds of jewelry.”

Vernon rubs the back of his neck, half in thought and half to block it from the sun for a second. “I only really have Western-style formal clothes.”

“Wear those!” Seungkwan grabs him when he tries to take a left turn and redirects him straight ahead. “You’re Western, you’re allowed to look Western. The festival doesn’t start ‘till after sunset so you should be cool enough.”

Vernon rolls his eyes, expecting a further dig at his delicate constitution, but it doesn’t come. Instead they continue the rest of the way in a fairly comfortable silence, eventually coming to the side entrance of the royal compound that they’ve gotten in the habit of using.

The guard positioned at the door takes one look at them, Seungkwan in what has become his ‘going out’ outfit of pants and a half-hazardly laced shirt and Vernon in his slightly awkward Southern-style clothes, before tapping on the gate and pulling it open. Seungkwan walks through, head held as high as always, with Vernon trailing slightly behind.

They pull to a stop when they reach the center of the courtyard. For some reason, the air feels thick between them in a way that Vernon doesn’t know to interpret. They just look at each other for a moment before Seungkwan rakes a hand through his hair, freeing his slightly sweaty brow to the air.

“This time tomorrow again, then?” the prince says, the edge of a laugh in his voice and his grin lopsided.

Vernon shifts, feels like he has to say something else for a second, before just nodding. “Yeah, of course.”

“Great.” The prince levels his smile at him for a second longer before finally turning and taking his path back to a different building. Vernon watches him go, not sure why he feels like he just missed something, before heading his own way back to his quarters.

 

The festival comes sooner than he had expected. Nayoung is the one to actually tell him when it is, one morning when she had been helping him hang some of his bedding out to air.

“It’s tradition to have a festival on a yearly basis, but this is the first one in a while to be a proper lunar celebration,” she explains, leaning up on her toes to pin the corner of his comforter onto a hanging line that they’ve strung through the small section of courtyard behind Vernon’s rooms. He’s been put on clip-holding duty, half because Nayoung told him to and half because they both recognized that she was a little taller than him when she tried to be.

“What’s that mean? A proper lunar celebration.”

“The church astronomer says there’ll be a red moon this time.” She twists to grab another pin from him. “The red moon is rare, and if we only celebrated whenever we had one we would only have two or three in a person’s lifetime. The royal family considers the festival an important part of the populace feeling close to them, though, so they hold one regardless of whether there’s a proper moon or not.”

Vernon nods, understanding a little more. “A red moon – we get those sometimes in the West, too. We don’t hold festivals for it or anything, though. Mostly people just think they’re a bad sign.”

Nayoung tilts her head to the side and comes back down onto the flats of her sandals. “It’s not so much that it’s a bad or good sign for us, I think. It’s like, it’s a sign from someone for something. It’s different for everyone, but it’s important for everyone to recognize it together.”

“The prince mentioned that his other sister would be there? For the religious part of the ceremony, or something?”

“Oh, Sojeong?” Nayoung picks up the wicker basket that they had been holding the bedding in before Vernon can move to grab it and heads back into his quarters, although the doors and windows are so wide open that it doesn’t feel much different inside. “There’s – it’s a little silly,” she hedges. “Some people think that the red moon gives us a closer link to the spirit world than we normally have access to. Sojeong will probably be responsible for some of the spirit reading that they do, although I’m sure she’ll only be available for some of the higher-up visitors.”

“Spirit reading? Like, fortune telling?” Vernon waves his hands at Nayoung when she shoots him an unimpressed look over the basket. “I’m serious, I don’t know anything about this.”

“It’s not really fortune telling. There’s no guarantee that you’ll suddenly come into money or that your mother will get sick or anything like that,” she says. “It’s more like… they get a feeling of your spirit. Whether it’s restless, or it’s missing something, or if a particular goddess is trying to reach out to you. It’s nothing definite, though. Just a sense of it.”

“And this is happening soon?”

She blinks at him. “It’s tomorrow, Sir Choi.”

He blinks right back at her. “Oh.”

She purses her mouth but then cracks into a smile. “Did no one tell you?”

Vernon groans a little and sits heavily down at the table, leaning back on his hands. “I feel like the prince finds it amusing to purposefully keep me out of the loop.”

“Well, it _is_ tomorrow. It doesn’t begin until later, after the sun sets, though. Although,” she continues, and taps at her chin. “You may be expected to be with the royal family. I’ll have to check with their schedule-keepers. If that’s the case, you should be ready to go by dusk.”

“Well,” he says, watching as she bustles around to put the basket away. “Sounds like it’ll be fun.”

All of his appointments the next day get cancelled, predictably, as the majority of the castle workers are busy with festival set-up. Vernon can’t see most of it from his quarters but Mingyu comes by in the early afternoon for lunch, with mussed hair and a haunted look in his eyes.

“I keep getting chased out of courtyards,” he says as he slides the door closed and collapses to the ground with a groan. “The second I stepped outside people were pushing me out because I was getting in the way, and then I’d be in another courtyard and they’d just do the same thing.”

“I’ve kind of just been hiding out in here,” Vernon says, laughing. “Trying to stay out of the way.”

“That’s smart.” Mingyu lets out a breath. “How’ve you been, anyways? I feel like you disappear whenever I look for you.”

“Uh,” Vernon glances away and picks at his rice a little. “I’ve been in the city a lot, actually, with the prince. He’s been… restless, I guess. It’s been fine,” he’s quick to add when Mingyu gives him a look. “We found a shopkeeper who lets him basically use his store as a personal library, and it’s all been safe so far.”

“That’s good,” Mingyu says, although he has a curious look on his face. “You two have really been getting along, then?”

Vernon frowns a little. “I guess? Any actual lesson teaching I’d been doing has kind of come to a crashing halt, though. I’m just following him through the city at this point, to try to minimize the trouble he gets into.”

Mingyu hums. “From what I hear that’s kind of what the prince needs right now, huh?”

“Yeah.” Vernon shifts, leans forward a little. “Do you know General Seungcheol at all?”

Mingyu tilts his head, adopting the almost puppy-like thinking pose that Vernon’s beginning to get fairly familiar with. “General Seungcheol? Not really. He hasn’t been in the capital in years. He’s kind of a big deal, though. He’s from a huge military family but he was still promoted, like, way earlier than anyone expected. I have a friend who used to serve at the base that he was in charge of before, and he said the General was always pretty friendly, if you didn’t screw up too much.”

“That’s kind of what the prince said, too.”

Mingyu raises an eyebrow. “And do you often talk to the prince about his love life?”

Vernon kicks out at him under the table. “It’s kind of relevant to me, you know. The general being moved to the West is the only reason I’m even here.”

Mingyu kicks right back but lets the topic drop, and they finish eating. Vernon half hopes that he can just go to the festival with Mingyu instead of having to wait to see if the prince comes to collect him, but the other man insists he has to duck out.

“My family’s traveled up from where we live, a little out of the city,” he says as he hauls himself up off the floor, joints cracking slightly. “I have to go meet them and show them around. You’ll be fine, just stay within the walls and you can’t get too lost.”

Vernon nods but doesn’t feel that confident. Nayoung had made it seem like the castle would be swarmed with people – he almost feels like it would be best to just skip it entirely, but he immediately discards that thought. He’s in the South, in the royal capital, during one of the rarer celebrations that they hold. Missing it would be a huge waste – Sophia would never let him live it down.

He does end up putting on Western clothes, after a long moment of debate where he just crouches in front of his trunks and stares back and forth between the two piles of differently-styled clothes. It’s way too hot still, even with the sun lowering in the sky, so Vernon ignores the voice that sounds suspiciously like his mother that nags at him in the back of his mind to wear a proper jacket.

He still feels a little too stuffy, though, when he puts on his proper trousers and shoes, his white shirt and dark vest that he buttons up close to his form. After a second of thought he gives in, undoes his cuffs, and rolls his sleeves up to his elbows. No one here will really know much about Western fashion, Vernon figures, so it won’t be that bad. He’ll look out of place no matter what, anyways.

Vernon’s just getting his tie tightened at the base of this throat when a rapid knocking rings out from his door. “Come in?” he manages, startled and glancing out at the courtyard outside. The sun was close to setting, and he hadn’t even noticed.

It’s Nayoung, who he hadn’t been expecting for some reason. She’s red-faced and a little out of breath as she slides the door open and peeks through. “Are you ready? I’m to bring you to the prince.”

“Uh, yeah.” He glances down at himself. “Do you think this is ok?”

She gives him the quickest once-over ever before nodding tightly and making a grabbing motion at him with one hand. “You look fine, now come, you’re going to be late.”

He startles into action and follows her quickly. She’s in a Southern-style dress, navy with crimson accents, with a few white flowers pinned in her hair. “You look nice,” he says, as they head down the hallway just a little faster than usual.

Nayoung shoots him a wry sideways look but smiles. “Thank you. As do you.” They reach the exit and she gathers her skirts up so they don’t drag on the stairs leading down from the door. “Here, we can cut through and get to the back of the main entrance, the royal family should be around there.”

“Lead the way.” The second they had left the building that his quarters are in Vernon had begun to be able to hear the low rumble of the oncoming crowd, but the closer they walk now the louder it gets. The sun is just hitting the horizon, still high enough that he can see it over the top of the outer walls but it’s falling quickly, and has turned a shade of fiery orange.

He twists after Nayoung as they scoot through a narrower alley between two buildings and then it suddenly opens up into the main entrance to the castle, and he gets a good look at the festival set-up for the first time. There are lanterns everywhere – strung from lines in the trees, held by everyone from the random servant passing by to the small children that immediately try to wind past Vernon’s knees. The main gates are swung wide open and the sea of people seems to extend all the way to the horizon, lit by orange flame and the last rays of the sunset.

Vernon lets Nayoung take his arm to lead him through the crowd because he’s too busy staring at everything that he can possibly see. Seungkwan was right about people dressing nice to this – everyone he sees is in robes or a dress, or some combination of the two, in deep jewel tones and formal black and light pastel and all accented by the gleam of metal jewelry. Not everyone’s in gold, of course, but even the humbler outfits they pass by still have a bronze or steel cuff around a wrist, or a more common piece of quartz dangling from an ear.

“Sir Choi!” Vernon startles and Nayoung drops his arm as he turns towards the voice. He almost doesn’t recognize the Crown Princess at first – Seungkwan had been right about her outfit as well. Her hair has somehow gained an extra half-foot of intricate designs and curling braids, and her eyes are lined carefully with black.

She waves a hand over her head, and her wrist jangles delicately with the number of shining bangles that are hanging on it. “Here, let him through, he’s to meet with us,” she gently instructs the guards who are stationed in front of her.

The guards around her step away to let him through, and reveal a spot against the wall of the main castle building where the family has obviously been stationed. A low couch has been brought out where the queen is sitting, feet carefully tucked to the side and hands folded in her lap. Next to her is the prince, and really, Vernon should be used now to seeing Seungkwan in his regalia, but this is somehow different.

Even to Vernon’s more untrained eye his robes are clearly of higher quality than they are normally, laying in silky folds around his form and trailing to rest on the grass below the bench. The outer coat is a deep navy that glints faintly silver when the light catches at it a certain way, and the under robes – there are at least two other layers, although past that Vernon can’t be sure – are shades of stormy grey and lighter blue. His eyes are lined with black just like Jinseol’s, which makes them look wider and brighter against his tan skin, and a thin circlet of silver sits carefully around his forehead.

The prince must have heard his sister call Vernon over because he’s straightened up in his seat and is staring at him. Some quick emotion flits over his face - Vernon can’t really tell what, because he’s inexplicably distracted by the way that the prince’s neck looks against the dark fabric of his robes. After that second, though, Seungkwan coughs into his sleeve and then flaps his hand to gesture him over.

“Look at you! A proper Western gentleman.” He beams up at Vernon when he approaches the bench, and leans into his mother’s side a bit. “Doesn’t he clean up nice?”

The queen smiles at him and leans back towards the prince. “Of course he does, you have a very handsome tutor.” She taps Seungkwan lightly on the cheek with a folded up fan that she’s holding. “After you’re done with him I may need some lessons. I should brush up my Western.”

Vernon laughs a little too loudly at the look that Seungkwan gives the queen. “ _Mother._ You are shameless.”

Jinseol laughs too and presses a hand to Vernon’s shoulder, ignoring the wary look that the closest guard gives the gesture. “Only if I can reserve him after you, mother.” She winks at Vernon and smiles wide when Seungkwan makes a very affronted noise. “The women of the Boo family love a man with brains.”

“You have a _husband_ ,” Seungkwan accuses, pointing at his sister. “What would he have to say about this?”

Jinseol pretends to think about this, now looping her arm through Vernon’s casually. “My darling has many good qualities, but speaking two languages fluently is not among them.”

Seungkwan scoffs and crosses his arms, but he has a teasing light in his eyes too. “And it wasn’t enough that he helped you bring two beautiful children into this world? You would betray him after that?”

“Well it’s not like he did most of the work,” she retorts. “I’m sure Sir Choi is wonderful with children, anyways.”

Vernon’s laughing a little too hard to really reply to his, so he just shakes head and collects his breath. “I’ve heard I’m a pretty good royal babysitter, your highness,” he says, and Jinseol directs a familiar mischievous grin at him

She opens her mouth to respond but before she gets the chance she’s interrupted by an older woman, who Vernon recognizes as one of their head servants from the more recent times he’s seen the royal family on official business. “It’s time for your greeting, your majesty,” she says, and helps the queen stand up from the couch. “The stage should be all set for you.”

“Thank you,” the queen replies, and Seungkwan stands too. Vernon hangs back, watching them be bustled over to a low wooden platform that he hadn’t noticed before, carefully bracketed by the guards as they move through the crowd. The platform is maybe four feet off the ground – not that tall but it gives them enough height to stand out from the mass of people when they climb the stairs.

A hush falls over the crowd as an even older woman dressed in all red takes the center of the stage, hands tucked in front of her. The high priestess, Vernon guesses, from the quiet set of her mouth and the religious symbols stitched onto her robes that he recognizes.

She waits for silence to fall before bending into a slight bow, really more of a curtsy than anything, and then addresses the audience. “On the eve of the red moon, with the blessing of the goddesses of above and below, we greet you. May I present his highness, Boo Seungkwan, son of the winds and blessed by the storms.”

The crowd murmurs as Seungkwan lowers into a deep formal bow, and then straightens back up to look out over the main entrance and beyond. More than maybe any time before he looks like royalty, Vernon muses. His chin is tilted up proudly, and his stance is steady and sure. With the colors of his robes surrounding his form and lit by the colors of the fading sunset, he looks almost like a storm cloud – something dangerous, and yet inexplicably beautiful.

“Her royal highness, daughter of the earth and formed of obsidian, Boo Jinseol.” The crown princess bows just the same as Seungkwan, although Vernon’s sideways view of her is mostly blocked by the prince. A few voices yell out excitedly when she straightens up, although they quickly hush back down.

“And finally, the Queen of the Southern kingdom, mother of the tides, on the 34th illustrious year of her reign. May the moon look kindly on her lands and her seas.” The queen, furthest from Vernon’s point of view but taking up more space than her small form would seem to do, sweeps down into the deepest bow of the three of them. The crowd erupts in noise, and the woman in red lets it roil before raising her hands again, at which everyone quiets.

“With the rising of the moon and the darkness of the sky, may we remember that we are not alone in this world.” Her voice is thin with age but seems to ring out clearly in the courtyard regardless, echoing off the sides of the exterior walls. “May the voices of those beyond us reach a little closer to our ears, and advise us of the path to take in the coming months.”

She bows finally, deep and graceful, and then the guards escort her and the family back off the stage. Seungkwan rushes immediately over to Vernon and takes his wrist, eyes sharp.

“C’mon, let’s go see Sojeong,” he says, pulling on Vernon’s arm and already turning away. “We have to get to her before the lines get too long.”

“Woah, ok,” Vernon sputters, and lets himself get yanked away from the royal family’s corner. “Is this the spirit reading thing?”

“’Spirit reading thing’,” Seungkwan scoffs. “It’s a tradition, and it’s going to be even better this year since it’s actually a real lunar celebration. I’ve never been to one before, you know,” he adds, tone a little softer as they push through a few groups of fairly important-looking people all gathered on one side of the stage. “This is the first proper red moon in thirty years.”

“Really?” Vernon pulls Seungkwan a little closer to his side when he almost clips the side of a woman with probably too many diamonds on her ears. “Nayoung said that the red moon means the goddesses and everything are closer, right?”

Seungkwan nods. “It’s a lunar eclipse scientifically, of course, but it’s supposed to symbolize that the earth is at equal planes between the moon and the sun.” His ears go a little red. “It may sound kind of ridiculous, but… it has meaning, I guess. I’ve never had a _proper_ lunar reading, you know, this is a big deal.”

They’re nearing one of the exterior walls, where a few tents made of deep red fabric are mounted against the stone. There are more guards here, apparently marking where the more elite of the priests and priestesses are seated in the tents. Seungkwan directs them to one of the end tents, which has delicate gold rope lining the flaps.

The crowd is a little thinner here behind the line of guards, which means Vernon spots Joshua much easier than he might in any other part of the courtyard. He’s dressed in a set of dove-grey robes and if it was anyone else he might look like he was arguing with one of the guards stationed outside the gold-trimmed tent, but instead he just kind of seems like he’s gently lecturing the soldier.

Seungkwan notices him too, obviously, and he lets go of Vernon to wave widely. “Joshua!” They pull up to him and he turns, startled, before laughing at the sight of them.

“Look at you,” Joshua says, mouth curled in a fond smile. “So you are a prince. It was harder to imagine when you were covered in dust in my shop.”

The prince grins and grabs at one of his hands, swinging it in the air between them. “And you! Who let you in this section, did you pass yourself off as some foreign noble?”

Joshua blushes and glances quickly at the guard he was speaking to, who looks more and more annoyed the longer their conversation goes.

“You did!” Seungkwan laughs. “You sneak! What, did you want to prowl through the tents up here and see if there were any old books you could pawn off of a priestess?”

Joshua raises an eyebrow but doesn’t deny it. “Are you here to vouch for me then, your highness?” His smile ticks up on one side. “I have been housing you for the past few weeks, after all.”

“I think he’s got you there,” Vernon mutters to the prince and grins at Joshua. “We may have a tag-along for our spirit readings.”

Joshua brightens, focused on Vernon now. “You are getting read, then?” He turns back to the prince. “If it’s not too much trouble I would actually appreciate joining along. I find the process fascinating.”

“You are such an academic,” Vernon teases, earning himself a look from Joshua.

“And you’re one to talk?” He laughs and shakes his head, and squeezes the prince’s hand between his. “I do appreciate it, your highness.”

Seungkwan pouts and pulls Joshua away from the guard and toward the tent, reaching with his free hand to hook his arm in one of Vernon’s as well. “I really wish you wouldn’t call me that, you know.”

“That would be very improper of me,” Joshua replies.

“More improper than impersonating a noble?”

“It’s for _scholarship_ , your highness. All’s fair in love and procuring rare books.”

Vernon’s shaking his head, amused, when they finally reach the tent. Seungkwan nods to the guard stationed at the flaps that block off the tent from the outside world and ducks through them. Vernon and Joshua share a quick look before following, half-expecting the guard to stop them before they pass through the fabric of the entrance.

They do make it through, however, and the scent of something strong and woodsy rises up to fill their lungs. The light is dim in the tent, casting shadows against the red fabric walls. There’s a very low wooden table, with a few cushions in front of it and a female figure on the other side. She’s wearing red robes like the head priestess, although the cut of them looks a bit different and the bottom half of her face is covered in a thin net veil. Her eyes curve in a familiar smile, though, and Vernon realizes that this must be Boo Sojeong.

“You’ve brought so many guests!” She exclaims, reaching over the table to clasp her brother’s hands in hers as Seungkwan sits down on the cushions across from her. “Happy lunar festival.”

“To you as well,” the prince replies, and Vernon and Joshua lower themselves carefully down on either side of him. “Have we beat the crowd?”

Sojeong laughs, head thrown back inelegantly. “You’re my first customers of the night!” She pauses to look at each of them, eyes dark and slightly piercing in the low light. “Readings for all of you, then?”

Seungkwan nods, letting go of her hands to pat Vernon on the arm lightly. “Sir Choi has never had a reading before, have you?”

Vernon shakes his head, feeling a little dizzy with the thick scent of the smoke that curls from the stick of incense on the table next to Sojeong’s elbow. “Never.”

“I had one last festival, but it was from a lower priestess.” Joshua shrugs a little sheepishly. “I’m curious how it’ll be this year.”

Sojeong nods and reaches towards Vernon. “Left to right, then?”

He freezes, and glances at Seungkwan for direction.

“Just give her a hand,” the prince tells him, chin tilted up as he eyes Vernon. “All you need to do is keep your mind blank.”

“That’s a little easier said than done,” Vernon mutters, but lets Sojeong take his right hand with both of hers.

She shoots him a smile and presses a thumb into the center of his palm while her other hand threads through his fingers, her palm to the back of his hand. “Just do your best. Think of something calm, or rhythmical.” With that she stills, and closes her eyes.

Vernon waits for a second before shifting just a little and closing his eyes as well. Something calm. For some reason the first thing that comes to mind is the grandfather clock back home, a huge thing made of dark wood that stood in his father’s study and ticked dully with every second. It used to drive him crazy when he had to do any work in the room, but the memory of the evenly-spaced sounds comes back easily.

He sits there for maybe a minute in silence, hand growing a little sweaty in Sojeong’s firm grasp, before she lets out a held breath. “Well,” she starts, and he opens his eyes to look back at her. “For a Western guest you have a fair number of Southern goddesses trying for your attention.”

“What?” Vernon twitches his hand, but Sojeong still has a grip on it. “What do they want?”

She tilts her head thoughtfully, eyes skipping down to look at their hands twined together. “It’s hard to say. It’s like if you’re in a room with a dozen people and they all try to say something different at the same time; you can’t make sense of it. Regardless,” she continues, and looks back up to pin Vernon with her gaze. “You seem to have a wealth of business to complete in the South. I feel like you won’t be leaving for some time, now.”

He blinks at her, wondering. “What does that mean?”

Sojeong shrugs and releases his hand, holding hers over the waft of smoke coming off the incense to her side. “I can only do so much interpretation before it really just becomes guesswork. Readings aren’t meant for specific, step-by-step instructions. All I can tell is that the South doesn’t seem ready to let you go.”

Seungkwan shifts next to Vernon, leaning forward towards the table with his hand outstretched. “Me next.”

Sojeong huffs at him. “Don’t be so impatient, brat.” She takes his hand just the same, though, and they both close their eyes.

This time Vernon can watch as Sojeong does the reading. Seungkwan’s expression is peaceful, blank, his mouth just a little open in concentration. Sojeong, on the other hand, has deeply furrowed eyebrows and a twist to her mouth. Vernon can see her eyes darting behind her closed eyelids, as if she was having a bad dream.

The reading lasts longer, this time, and it’s ticking towards five minutes before Sojeong heaves out a breath and opens her eyes again. She looks at Seungkwan for a moment, brows still furrowed, before she speaks. “What have you done to piss off the goddess of fate?”

Seungkwan startles, blinking his eyes wide. “What?”

“She’s mad at you,” Sojeong continues. “Or…something. She’s upset about something regarding you, at least. Something went wrong from what she had planned, but I’m not sure if it’s your fault or not.”

The prince tilts his head, and Vernon watches him swallow nervously. “Can I… Can I do anything about it?”

Sojeong shakes her head slowly, letting go of his hand. “I don’t think so? If it’s fate it should reorient itself naturally, but she seemed… worried.” She shakes her head again, a little stronger this time. “I’m not sure.”

Silence draws out, before Sojeong turns to Joshua and holds her hand out. “Well. Last but not least?”

Joshua laughs anxiously, and Vernon sees him glance carefully over at the prince, who has his fingers twisted together in his lap now. “Here we go, then.”

Just like before, both Joshua and Sojeong close their eyes. This time, however, Sojeong’s expression stays calm and serene, forehead smooth and unwrinkled. After only a minute she opens her eyes again, and there’s a manic light in them now.

“There’s something coming.” She leans forward over their joined hands, stare pointed and bright. “Something huge, something that will change your entire life. You won’t be able to escape it – it’s as sure as the erosion of a cliff side by the ocean, or the crashing of a tidal wave.”

Joshua tugs his hand away, a nervous edge on his voice when he responds. “That sounds ominous.”

Sojeong shakes her head. “No, it’s something wonderful. It won’t be without pain, or struggle, but…” She almost has to catch her breath. “It’ll be beautiful.”

Vernon glances at Seungkwan and finds him watching Joshua with rapt attention. Joshua, on his part, looks thoroughly stunned. “Well – thanks, I guess,” he stutters, and Sojeong gathers herself enough to nod to them all.

“Hopefully I was able to direct you as the goddesses wish,” she says, and then reaches out to pinch Seungkwan’s cheek. “Tell Mother I say hi.”

He pouts and rubs at his face but nods. “I will. Have a good night.”

The three of them stand and duck out of the tent. A small crowd has gathered outside, looking like mostly ministers and other high nobles. Seungkwan tucks his arm through Vernon’s again, with Joshua following on his other side a bit blankly, his gaze pointed towards the ground.  

“Well,” the prince begins, weaving them back through the crowd and towards where the royal family had been stationed earlier, “I can’t say that was the clearest reading I’ve ever had. You know, last year they just told me that I should be more careful around open windows. What’s that supposed to mean?”

“This castle feels like nothing _but_ open windows.”

“You see my problem, then.”

They’re ducking through a slightly more crowded section of the courtyard when the sudden sound of stumbling and surprised noises makes Seungkwan twist around, Vernon in tow. Joshua had been trailing behind them a little, and somehow managed to weave off path and crash into a passing figure. He yelps, feet almost swept from under him, but the other person immediately has an arm around his waist and catches him from falling.

“I’m so sorry, I wasn’t watching where I was going,” Joshua sputters, clinging to the person’s upper arms. Seungkwan hurries back to Joshua, Vernon behind him, but then stops. In the meantime, Joshua’s managed to find his feet again and is standing on his own, still stuttering an apology.

Vernon pulls up behind Seungkwan and pauses too. Joshua’s flushed with embarrassment, eyes wide as he looks at the person he ran into. Vernon shifts, and glances at the other person. He blinks, surprised for a second, but then feels a slow thought uncurl in the back of his mind. No way.

General Seungcheol, in what is clearly his dress uniform, has one arm still wound around Joshua’s waist as if he hasn’t realized that he’s gotten his balance back now. He hasn’t seen Vernon and the prince yet, because his stare is locked with Joshua’s. He looks like he just got bowled over by a tidal wave.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So obviously this is a short chapter and a late one - sorry about both of those things! I'm wrapping up my final semester at school so things are a little crazy, and I finally got enough written out that I wanted to post it now instead of waiting to get a few more scenes down. Sorry for this, and hopefully my schedule will pick back up a little more soon!! Thanks for waiting!

The air seems suspended, somehow, warm and thick as honey and just as golden-yellow with the light of the lanterns. Everything moves just a little slower than Vernon thinks it maybe should, for a moment.

Then, quick as anything, the sound of the festival rushes in to fill the silences that had stretched between them all, and Joshua carefully pulls himself back a step. Vernon feels stuck somewhere between stunned and amused, especially when the general finally looks over and notices him and the prince.

Seungcheol’s shoulders stiffen, and he straightens up as he turns towards them. “Seungkwan.” He still looks out of it, eyes a little wide, but he grins at the two of them just the same. “I was looking for you, you disappeared after the opening greetings.”

Vernon watches as the prince cagily glances between the general and Joshua before tipping his chin up. “We went to get a reading done.” He focuses in on Seungcheol, eyes bright. “Have you gotten one yet?”

Seungcheol shakes his head. “I’ve been on managing detail for some of the guards that are here, I just got let off now. I think they’re a bit overwhelmed with readings right now anyways, so I was just going to look around the vendors and everything.”

Seungkwan hums, and then suddenly reaches out to tug Joshua forward from where he had been standing slightly behind the rest of them. “I’m sorry, I’m being so rude. This is Hong Joshua. He owns a store in the city,” the prince continues, and sounds so proud that it’s like he’s talking about his own shop. “This is General Seungcheol, Joshua.”

Joshua lets himself get pulled forward next to the prince and across from the general and he smiles tentatively at him. “It’s nice to meet you. My Southern name is Jisoo, if that – um, if that’s any easier to remember.”

The general’s grin stays just as wide but something about the edges softens, a little. “It’s nice to meet you. How do you know Seungkwan?”

Joshua shoots the prince a look, and his smile turns slightly wry. “His Highness has been a very reliable customer of mine, as of late.”

Seungkwan sniffs but continues clinging a little to Joshua’s arm. “Joshua’s store is the best, he has an amazing collection.” He tips his head towards the general a little. “Actually, Seungcheol, you should really visit some time. Joshua has more naval history books than any of the royal libraries, and I’m sure more than your old base had, with it being in the middle of nowhere and everything.”

The general shoots Seungkwan a fond but exasperated look. “I’d hardly call it the middle of nowhere,” he grouses. “It’s the third-largest island.”

“And still one of the least-populated,” Seungkwan shoots back, and all of a sudden he has a hand tucked into the crook of Vernon’s elbow. “I have to go find my mother. Seungcheol, will you take Joshua with you to go see the vendors? I’m sure he wants to look around as well.”

The general blinks, taken aback, and then shrugs. “Yeah, um, of course.” He glances at Joshua, who looks like he can’t decide whether to look angry or a little scared. “You’ve been to one of these celebrations before, right?”

“Yes,” Joshua says, finally seeming to emotionally land on ‘uncomfortable but not going to argue’. “But I’m always looking for things to bring back home, you know.”

The two of them continue talking while Seungkwan bodily drags Vernon away and back towards the corner that the royal family had been sitting in before the opening greetings.

Vernon tries to twist to look back at Joshua and Seungcheol but the prince’s grip is deceptively firm and the most he can do is crane his head back a little. “So where are we actually going?”

“We need to regroup,” the prince hisses. They end up breezing right past the bench where Vernon can just glimpse the queen sitting, surrounded by guards and talking quietly to a man that he thinks is the crown princess’s husband.

Instead of stopping with them Seungkwan yanks Vernon around the side of a building and then grabs his shoulders to shake him. “Do you know what this means?”

“Um,” he says dumbly. The prince is flushed high in his cheeks and his eyes look so wide that Vernon’s a little worried they may pop right out of his skull. “No? Are you ok?”

Seungkwan shakes his head wildly, and then shakes Vernon a little more for good measure. “No! Well, yes, maybe, I don’t know. This is what Sojeong was talking about, you know. Literally _five minutes ago_.” He huffs loudly and shoots a look back out towards the main area of the festival. “Joshua’s so lucky, he gets his reading played out in _minutes_ , meanwhile I still don’t understand any of mine from the last few years.”

Vernon shifts, and takes the prince’s hands to pull them off of him and down in between them. “Try talking a little slower. I don’t know if I get what you’re saying.” Or, he thinks he does, but he’d really appreciate Seungkwan to spell it out for him.

“They’re in love!” The prince’s eyes are all but sparkling, and he grips Vernon’s hands tightly. “Or, maybe not yet, but they will be. It’s what Joshua’s reading was about, the wonderful thing to happen to him. They must be fated,” he continues, and his expression goes soft and dreamy. “That’s why he couldn’t escape it, it was destiny.”

Seungkwan’s gaze sharpens, and he looks back at Vernon. “We have to do something.”

“Um. Like what?”

“Something! Something to get them to realize it. It’s love at first sight, it must be, we have to make sure they understand it.” He pauses, and then his brow furrows. “Well, now I _really_ can’t marry Seungcheol.”

“This is where you draw the line?” Vernon asks, tone a little sarcastic.

The prince hits him on the arm but only lightly, and then brings his hand up to cover his pursed lips. “Seungcheol’s the type to pine and not say anything, he’s too committed to _duty_ , and all that shit.” He ignores Vernon’s incredulous snort, instead barreling on his train of thought. “My mother won’t listen if it’s just me whining about the engagement, she’ll think it’s just because I don’t want to move to the West.”

“You don’t want to move to the West, though,” Vernon reminds him. Their fingers are still tangled together with one hand each, and he doesn’t know if he should move or not.

“Well of _course_ I don’t, but now that’s not the only reason.” Seungkwan pouts. “There should really be a caveat allowing for acts of god in betrothal vows. I’m surprised no one’s thought of it before me.”

“Well you _are_ a prodigy, your Highness.” Vernon lets himself get hit again and just shakes his head, grinning. “What, then? Do we go to your mother and just tell her that you obviously can’t marry someone who’s basically destined to love someone else? I don’t know Her Majesty that well, but something tells me she won’t buy that.”

Seungkwan’s mouth twists, and he looks deep in thought. “I’ll have to think of something. If I can get mother to approve it then Seungcheol won’t care about breaking the engagement. He’s really only dedicated to this because he’s sworn to be, he doesn’t get much out of it regardless.” He sighs, and rolls his eyes up to stare at the night sky. “It’s a curse, having the romantic futures of so many people resting entirely on your shoulders.”

Vernon snorts a laugh. “What a difficult life you lead.”

The prince opens his mouth as if to answer, but then the noise of the crowd in the courtyard entrance swells in volume out of nowhere. They both jump, tightening their grip on each other’s hand before the prince seems to realize and drops it.

“C’mon,” he says, not looking Vernon in the eyes but turning instead back to the crowd. “I think the moon’s out.”

They duck back around the wall of the building they were hiding behind as the volume of the crowd dips back down again, becoming something hushed and whispery. Most of the main lanterns have been put out, leaving just a few small ones that are carried by townspeople and some of the kids that have stopped running around long enough to look up at the sky. It leaves the courtyard blanketed in the deep navy of the night that had long enough fallen around them, and Vernon draws to a stop next to the prince before tipping his chin back. Looks up.

Since that first night, he’s still only sort of gotten used to seeing the different formations of constellations that they get in the South. The night sky is clearer, too, less polluted from the bright lights of the Western capital and easier to see without the low-hanging clouds of winter. The stars are bright pin-pricks of light, dazzling even though the sky is darker than it usually is.

The moon is full, and by this point it’s hanging fat and heavy just above the height of the exterior wall. Just like Seungkwan and Nayoung had been saying before, it looks like it’s been washed a bronze-red with watercolors. Instead of casting everything in the silvery light that it normally does, things take on an almost eerie shade of blood.

The prince moves at his side, and then slips a hand to his elbow. His fingers are hot, and burn a little on Vernon’s bare skin where his sleeve is rolled up. “Look over there.”

Vernon tears his eyes away after a beat and looks down from the sky. He doesn’t have to scan the crowd for long before he sees them. The general and Joshua must not have been able to get far before they stopped to look at the moon; they’re at the back of the courtyard near the small stage from earlier, maybe forty feet away from Vernon now.

Joshua looks entranced, head tilted back and up, mouth slightly open although his brows look furrowed. Vernon can almost picture him hurriedly taking notes later that night. Seungcheol, on the other hand, looks unsure and awkward, and his gaze darts back and forth from the moon to Joshua’s face.

As they watch Vernon sees Joshua lean over a little and murmur something to the general, who responds just as quietly. His eyes look warm, and one of his hands raises as if to touch Joshua on the back before it hesitates, and then falls to his side again.

Seungkwan’s basically vibrating next to Vernon now, and his fingers are digging into his arm. “You see?” he hisses. “We have to do something.”

Vernon’s not entirely sure how he got pulled into this, but between the way that Joshua is now looking at Seungcheol and the determination coating every syllable that Seungkwan says, he can’t bring himself to argue.

 

Vernon’s only awake for maybe an hour the next morning before a harried and slightly hungover Nayoung arrives to his rooms.

“Sir Choi,” she starts, and then tries to continue but is interrupted by Seungkwan pushing himself into the room from behind her.

“Alright, greetings are over, we have a job to do,” he declares, pointing a finger at Vernon where he’s sitting on the floor at his table, shirt only half-on. “Pull yourself together.”

Vernon sputters but yanks his shirt the rest of the way on, shaking his hair out when he finally gets his head through it. “It’s, like, eight in the morning.”

“The queen rises early, and we have to catch her before she gets stuck in a meeting or something.” The prince flops to the ground next to Vernon and quickly steals a piece of fruit from his breakfast tray. “We have to tell her, we have to get this marriage nullified,” he says around the piece of melon, cheeks bulging a little.

Vernon shakes his head but grabs his bag from the side of the table and heaves himself up off the ground. The prince follows, shoving the rest of the fruit in his mouth and springing back up. “Do you really think it’s gonna be that easy?” he asks, watching as the prince straightens his navy robes and brushes his hair off his forehead.

“Maybe not,” Seungkwan allows, pushing past him to lead the way out of the room and into the hallway, “but we have to try.”

They find the queen in her main office, not the formal space that they use for things like receiving diplomats and other royalty but the one she actually works in. The attendant who lets them in gives them a suspicious look but clearly knows enough to let Seungkwan get what he wants, and so the two of them slip into the office to face Her Majesty.

She’s in formal robes and is kneeling at a low table, which is covered in loose paper that she seems to be reviewing with an advisor at her side. Jinseol’s there too, at her other side, with her hair loose and only half-pinned so it’s out of her eyes.

Her Majesty looks up when they enter and her mouth curves into an expectant smile. “Seungkwan, Sir Choi,” she greets them as they bow. “How can I help you? Did you enjoy the festival last night, Sir Choi?”

“Oh, of course,” Vernon’s quick to answer, shooting a nervous look at the prince. “It was beautiful.”

The queen nods and sets her packet of papers to the side before gesturing for them to sit down. The advisor stands to leave, but Jinseol just makes herself comfortable on the seat cushion and props her chin on her hand. “Well I’m glad you could see a proper Southern celebration during your time here,” Her Majesty says, and then reaches out to take Seungkwan’s hand. She pats the back of it. “I see you weren’t out all night like you usually are at these things, you look mostly rested.”

The prince laughs and shrugs sheepishly. “I guess not.”

The queen tuts but releases his hand, turning instead to Jinseol. “You remember how he was as a child, don’t you? Always running off and getting lost in the city.”

The crown princess hums in thought, eyes sparking mischievously. “Him and Soonyoung, that’s right. I remember having to get some guards to chase them down from the exterior wall when they were younger; I thought one of them would fall and crack their head open like an egg.”

Seungkwan whines until they stop, and finally succeeds in getting their attention. “Mother,” he starts, voice sure and steady but Vernon can see his hands gripping the hem of his robe tightly in his lap. “I can’t marry General Seungcheol.”

There’s a pause, and Vernon watches Jinseol’s face shift into a dramatic expression of confusion while the queen’s barely moves at all, save for one eyebrow twitching up a little. “You can’t?” The queen asks. “And why not?”

“I – it’s not our fate. To, um, marry each other.” The prince shifts in his seat. “We got readings, last night, from Sojeong, and – do you know the scholar in town that I’ve mentioned before? Joshua?”

“I remember that name, yes,” the queen says. Her voice is carefully level but Vernon can see some edge of annoyance in her gaze. “What does he have to do with this?”

“Well,” the prince rushes on forward. “Joshua got a reading too, and it was all about how he was destined to have this big change in his life, right? And then we leave the reading and he immediately runs into Seungcheol and I _know_ this sounds crazy,” he says, when Jinseol makes a face, “but they’re in _love_ , or they _will_ be.”

The prince quiets for a second, hands still twisting anxiously at his robes in a way that makes Vernon want to reach out and calm them. “I can’t get in the way of that. You understand that, right?”

The queen just regards him for a long, silent moment. Jinseol looks a bit like she wants to crawl right out of her skin, twitchy and clamping her mouth shut around who knows what kind of outcry, but she clearly feels like she has to defer to her mother.

Times stretches out, and Vernon’s sure it’s not actually lasting as long as he feels like it is but it seems like ages before the queen finally sighs and lowers her eyes to shake her head. “Seungkwan. I understand that betrothal is scary, but you didn’t have to lie to me like this.”

The prince makes an affronted noise but Her Majesty holds up a hand to stop him from saying anything. “Even if the reading was just as you said it was, don’t pin the blame for this on the General.” She shifts her gaze to Vernon, and it’s simultaneously stern and somehow warm. “You must be quite the man, Sir Choi.”

Another pause. The gears in Vernon’s head feel rusted, because he can’t quite make sense of what’s happening now, and Seungkwan beats him to it. “Um,” the prince starts, and when Vernon glances at him he’s starting to flush. “What?”

“I mean,” and the queen shifts to fold her arms. “Over 20 years of listening to him whine and it turns out that my son just had to meet someone from a different kingdom to find the person that he wants to spend his life with.” The side of her mouth slants up in a smile, and she regards them from across the table. “You do love to make things difficult.”

Jinseol huffs and leans across the table at them. “Does Seungcheol know?”

Vernon opens his mouth but nothing comes out, and he turns to Seungkwan instead. The prince isn’t looking at him, and his mouth is hanging open too, making him look kind of like a fish. He blinks a few times, then shakes his head. “No, I haven’t said anything to him yet.”

The queen nods, which Vernon only sees out of the corner of his eye because he’s trying desperately to get the prince to look at him. Seungkwan doesn’t – instead he reaches over and grabs one of Vernon’s hands, pulling it up to place the back of Vernon’s hand on the table and lace his own fingers through Vernon’s on top. Seungkwan’s palm is clammy, and he squeezes their hands together tightly, almost in warning.

“Well.” The queen folds her hands on the table as well, and casts a tired look at Jinseol. “I’d rather you come to me straight away like this than you two just elope, I suppose.” She levels a stern gaze at Seungkwan, mouth twisting a little. “An ambassador is certainly a better marriage candidate than some other options that you could have chosen. We’ll send a messenger to your family at once,” she says to Vernon, and his gut tightens at that. “Try to get things straightened out. Do you have any idea if you’re to pick up your father’s position after he retires?”

“Um.” He stutters out, feeling a bit like a deer caught in the barrel sight of a rifle. “I think he wants me to, but – nothing’s set, yet.”

The queen nods. “We’ll figure that out, as we’re making a new betrothal contract. And, of course, we’ll discuss this with the General at once,” she says this to Seungkwan. “We wouldn’t want him to think we were working behind his back.”

Seungkwan nods hurriedly, and shifts to lean against Vernon’s side. “Of course, right, we’ll do that.”

The queen shakes her head, mouth set in a fond grimace. “Of course. Now get out of my office. I have some things to work out.”

Seungkwan scrambles off the floor, yanking Vernon up with him. “Right. Thank you, mother,” he says, bowing. Vernon only barely manages to bow as well. “I’m glad, um, that you accept our love, and, uh, and everything.”

And with that the prince is pulling Vernon behind him and out of the room. They make it down the hall before the prince lets go of his hand and all but collapses onto the ground in a crouch. His face is buried in his robes so Vernon can’t see his expression, but he’s shaking with laughter.

Carefully, Vernon kneels down too. “Um,” he tries. “Are you alright?”

Seungkwan shakes his head but keeps his face hidden. The back of his neck is turning bright red with the effort of trying to reign in his laughter, and when he finally looks up his eyes are watery. He looks a little mad. “I just can’t stay out of engagements, can I?”

Vernon sits fully down on the ground, glancing around to make sure that no one is nearby and close enough to listen in. “I guess not.”

Seungkwan sits down too, and stretches his legs out so that his foot bumps up against Vernon’s shin. “Why would she do that?”

“What?”

“Just assume we’re in love?” He twists his hands together again. “Where did that come from?”

Vernon shrugs. “I guess because you brought me with you to talk about dissolving the betrothal? She must have just assumed, I guess, that I was personally invested in it.”

Seungkwan snorts. “That seems like a pretty big leap to make.” He deflates a little, and looks Vernon in the eyes. “I’m sorry for dragging you into this, though. I didn’t know what else to say.” His shoulders sink even more, and his gaze dips to the ground. “Now I have a whole other betrothal to figure out breaking.”

Vernon shifts, and feels a little like he’s going to say something dumb but his mouth moves without his consent. “We, um. We don’t _have_ to break it.”

The prince stills and looks back at him. “We don’t?”

Vernon shrugs. “It’s not like I have anyone waiting for me back at home, or anything. People marry for reasons other than love all the time; this doesn’t have to be any different.”

He sets his jaw a little and glances away so he doesn’t have to watch the confusion swim in the prince’s eyes. The mosaic on the wall across from them is a swirling pattern that reminds him of storm clouds, somehow. “You don’t want to leave the South, and you don’t want to get set up with someone who’s going to try to make you leave. I don’t really want to be stuck in an office in the West somewhere doing paperwork for the rest of my life, no matter how high-status the position is. And besides,” he continues, lowering his eyes more to pick at his nailbeds. “You might be one of the very few marriage options my mother would actually approve of, being royalty and all.”

Seungkwan doesn’t say anything for long enough that eventually Vernon chances a look up at him, just to see his expression. It’s not exactly what he expected.

The prince’s eyes are wide and shining, his usual spark of excitement back in full force. He lunges forward and grabs Vernon’s hands, grip tight. “You, Sir Choi,” he says, voice hushed to a whisper. “You might be the real genius of the two of us.”

“Thanks,” Vernon says wryly, but can’t find it in himself to look away from the prince’s eyes. “That means a lot.”

“No, really.” Seungkwan’s hands tighten more and suddenly he’s very close. “Are you sure? Are you absolutely positive? My mother won’t let me break an engagement twice, so if we do this then we’re doing this.”

Vernon swallows, and shifts on the ground so he’s a little further away from Seungkwan – he can see his eyelashes individually this close up, and that realization makes something tighten in his stomach. “You’re the one who seems to have more to lose, in this situation. I’m on board if you are.”

The prince seems to realize how close he’d gotten and he leans back too, although he still has a death grip on Vernon’s hands. “I don’t see how I’m losing anything.” Seungkwan shifts his fingers so that he’s actually holding Vernon’s hands, rather than just his wrists. “If my fiancé is educated, not a total stick-in-the-mud, won’t make me leave the South for longer than a few weeks at a time, and is handsome on top of all of that, then I think that’s a win for me.”

Vernon feels himself flush and pulls his hands away to steady himself against the ground as he hauls himself up. “Ok, um. If we have that decided, then I think I have a letter to write.”

Seungkwan tilts his head up to watch him instead of getting off the floor, and something about the angle of his eyes from that far down sends another twist through his gut. Vernon pretends to busy himself with finding a pen in his book bag. “My sister is going to be pissed at me when she finds out that I found a spouse without her approval.”


	6. Chapter 6

Things get much more complicated much more quickly than Vernon had expected. He writes to Sofia – well, he writes to the whole family, but Sof gets a separate letter explaining things a little more delicately. Seungkwan had made it very clear that he couldn’t tell anyone the depth of the deception they were trying to pull off with the engagement; as far as the queen was concerned, they were very much in love. Vernon felt just a bit awful about the whole thing, though, and so Sofia got a slightly edited version with the proper amounts of veiled apologies.

 _I think you’d like him, though, Sof_ , Vernon writes that night after everything happened. _He’s a little wild but he’s really smart, and funny, and kind. A bit spoiled, but he is a prince, after all._

Vernon hesitates a second, lifting up the tip of his pen and biting at his lip before returning pen to paper. _I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about him, but it seems like it happened really quickly. I hope that you’ll forgive me. He’s excited to meet you._

He finishes the letter and seals it in an envelope, leaving it on the table to give to Nayoung the next morning. That night, which is as warm as all the nights have been lately but sends a chill up his spine anyways, Vernon sits in the windowsill of his bedroom and just watches the stars.

Almost like it knew he was waiting for it, Joshua’s raven appears after maybe twenty minutes of him sitting in silence. The bird lands on the exterior wall and seems to look at him, and then darts closer. It stops on the ground, standing on a flat stone inlaid into the pathway about five feet from him.

“Hey.” The raven doesn’t move, just tilts its head at him like it’s waiting for something. “I don’t have any food for you, if that’s what you want.”

The bird still doesn’t budge, and Vernon feels a little pinned by the dark stare of its eyes. He sighs, and wraps his arms around his knees. This is dumb, but: “Can I talk to you?”

The raven continues to not do anything, which Vernon takes as an affirmative. “I may have done something stupid.” He tucks his chin onto his knees and blinks sleepily out into the night. “It’s not really any of my business. None of this is any of my business – I’m just the tutor, and sure, Joshua is kind of my friend, but that doesn’t mean I just have to volunteer to marry the fiancé of his, like, soulmate, or whatever.”

The raven rustles its wings and steps a little closer to him. “I know, right? Talk about spur of the moment decisions. And this is, just, the rest of my _life_.” None of it had really sunken in until Vernon had managed to shake the prince off sometime before dinner, and when he finally had a second to himself the panic had set in.

He worries at the skin of his bottom lip some more, a nervous habit he hadn’t realized he had until he came to the South. “I guess it’s not the worst thing, though, right? The prince – Seungkwan, he’s fine. Or, he’s great. He’s funny and kind of the sweetest, huh?” He chuckles a little, and the sound makes the raven pull its head back away from him a bit. “Who would’ve guessed, considering what a brat he was the first few days I was here.”

“So, ok.” A cool breeze ruffles Vernon’s hair over his forehead and he rakes it back impatiently, making a mental note that he might need a haircut soon. “I’m engaged to a prince. I guess I’m going to be a prince consort?” He shakes his head, and the raven pecks at something in the grass. “I think I can do that.”

The raven looks back up at him and tilts its head to the side, regarding him, before spreading its wings and flying back off in a flutter of black feathers. One feather falls, buffeted on the wind of its wings and landing in the grass just underneath the open window that Vernon’s sitting in. He looks at it for a moment before dipping a hand down and picking it up.

After a few seconds Vernon huffs a laugh and tips his head back to look up at the sky. “Getting a bit heavy-handed with the symbolism, maybe.” There’s no reply, although he would like to think that the foreign stars glint just a little stronger in response.

That night, he dreams. He dreams most nights, but he usually only remembers bits and pieces, distorted and half-formed images. This dream, he remembers the entire thing when he wakes up.

It begins with a start – he’s standing on the observation tower deck, and it’s dark out. The sun has just barely begun to rise, and it’s sending thin rays of red above the waves of the ocean out in the distance. The sea looks rough, with white caps tumbling about the surface.

Vernon doesn’t know why, but he feels like he’s waiting for something. He’s back in his formal Western clothes, the ones he wore two days ago at the lunar festival, but they feel too tight somehow.

Suddenly: “Vernon!” It’s the prince’s voice, close and intimate against the side of his neck. For some reason, the sound of him saying his name sends shivers down Vernon’s spine – does Seungkwan usually say his name like that? Does he usually say his name at all?

Regardless of anything, Seungkwan’s there, dressed in lustrous robes in amber and elegant forest green. His hair catches the red of the sunrise and sends it burning. He clings to Vernon, arms tight around his waist and chest flush to his shoulder, and his eyes look huge and deep this close up.

“D’you have it?” The prince asks. His earrings dangle low and when he sets his chin on Vernon’s shoulder one of them dips down to skip against the skin of his throat.

In the dream, Vernon knows exactly what he’s talking about. “Yeah.” He shifts, and pulls a necklace out from where it had been tucked inside his shirt. It’s gold, the metal warmed from his skin, and when he opens his hand to let Seungkwan see the pendant on the end of the chain he recognizes it instantly.

It’s his mother’s – or, rather, it was. It’s a circle pendant inlaid with the family crest on her side of the family, the Western side. Vernon passes his thumb over the indents of the pattern, tracing the strong lines and the small engraving of an antlered buck on the bottom. She had given it to him when he left for university, and he had kept it with him since. He didn’t usually wear it, though, and it feels heavy against his chest.

Seungkwan watches as he pulls it off of his neck and, shaking his hair back into place, holds it out for the prince to take. Seungkwan handles it like glass, and the second he cups his hands around it Vernon’s heart jumps like Seungkwan had reached out into his chest and grabbed that instead.

“Are you sure?” Seungkwan asks, and although he doesn’t know what it refers to Vernon feels himself nodding. Seungkwan eyes him with a careful gaze before setting his jaw and nodding, and then steps away.

Vernon feels entirely absent from his body as he watches the prince, backlit now with the brilliant, fiery rays of the sunrise, take a careful step towards the edge of the observation tower upper deck. Seungkwan straightens his shoulders, and –

The old railing surrounding the deck is gone, completely disappeared. Sudden panic grips Vernon’s gut, but he can’t move. Seungkwan seems very, very close to the edge of the deck.

The sunrise shifts to a golden yellow and Vernon watches Seungkwan raise his hand and dangle the pendant out over the edge of the drop. The prince pauses, and looks sideways towards Vernon. His eyes are clear and curve warmly in a smile.

“I know you can do it.” He drops the necklace. Somewhere, Vernon thinks he hears a feminine voice say something unintelligible – it almost sounds like Nayoung. Before he has a chance to think about it, though, his stomach drops through his feet and then he’s awake, panting against his sweaty pillow and staring wide-eyed through the window next to his bed.

 

Vernon tries to avoid telling anyone about the whole ‘surprise engagement’ thing for as long as possible, but in a castle like that there is really only so long information can go under the radar. Only two days after their meeting with the Queen, Vernon overhears a few maids whispering to each other only to watch them fall carefully quiet when he wanders by them in the hallway. They shoot him curious looks, before one blushes and claps her hands on her cheeks and comments to another about how ‘romantic’ everything is.

He walks away a little too quickly after that.

Mingyu finds out next – and with him comes basically the rest of the castle, because he chooses to burst into the courtyard where Vernon was trying to eat lunch and catch up on some Southern studies and loudly declare his presence which a booming, “You two are engaged?!”

Vernon jumps and promptly knocks over a glass of water that had been sweating onto the table in the heat. He takes some time to curse over the book he only narrowly avoided soaking while Mingyu paces over and huffs at him some more.

A few minutes later, after Mingyu seems to have calmed a bit and Vernon finally got him to just sit down already, the other man levels a look at him. “Am I going crazy,” he pronounces carefully, and Vernon shifts uncomfortably in his seat. “Or did this happen pretty quickly?”

Vernon sighs and traces a wet path on the table of water that had been missed when he had tried to clean up quickly. “No, it did. Um. I don’t know.” This was the worst part of all of this; the genuine insistence on being in love with Prince Seungkwan. Not just in love but _passionately_ so, enough to make him break a previous engagement. “We just… it felt right, you know?” Vernon shrugs, eyes still down. “He’s… he’s really special to me.”

Mingyu’s silent, and when Vernon looks back up at him his face is serious. Finally, he sighs and rubs a hand over his face. “I guess I maybe saw this coming. I just didn’t think you’d, like, elope with the guy.”

Vernon blinks. “You saw it coming?”

Mingyu shrugs too. “Yeah, kind of. Like, looking back, it makes sense. He wouldn’t listen to anybody until you got here – not his teachers, his sisters, nothing. Suddenly you’re here and he’s actually going to lessons. Not just yours, either,” he continues, leaning back on his palms. “His economics tutor says he’s been going to all of her classes, too, and he hasn’t missed one of the weekly ministry meetings in ages.”

Vernon digests this information, feeling a bit knocked off-kilter. “And you think that’s all because of me?”

“Sure,” Mingyu says, tone casual. “He likes you, it’s obvious. Even if I didn’t know he liked you _this_ much,” and he pulls a face that has Vernon kicking at his shins under the table to defend the imaginary honor of his engagement. “Even if I didn’t know that, I’d still be able to see it a little. He’s happier, now. You weren’t around this past winter, or even last summer. He’s like a different person.”

Vernon nods slowly. At this point it feels strange, almost anathema, to think of a more subdued, bitter Seungkwan. Even the thought of the figure of the prince in the portrait that hung in his father’s study, cast in black robes and smaller than he’d ever seen Seungkwan, makes him feel a little uneasy.

Mingyu shrugs and reaches over to steal a piece of fish with his fingers from Vernon’s plate. “Either way, I’m looking forward to the wedding. They always break out all the stops for these things – you should have seen the crown princess’s wedding a few years ago, I ate for _days_.”

 

_My darling son,_

_I have to admit that this letter was not something your father or I expected. While you are reaching the age where I would think you would start thinking about marriage, this is certainly not how I thought you would go about it._

_I have to ask: are you sure, sweetie? This just sounds so very uncharacteristic of you. You were never interested in anyone back home. I always assumed I would have to really push to get you to court anyone, much less propose to them. And royalty, at that. This Prince Seungkwan must be something. I do hope I’ll be able to meet him soon, if he’s as wonderful as all this._

_Nevertheless, your father and I are very happy for you. I’ll need to find some of my father’s old wedding things, I’m sure we have them packed away in the attic. Write immediately if you think there is anything else you may need; otherwise we’ll be sailing down soon. Her Majesty wrote to tell us that the wedding is scheduled for only a month from now – that seems so soon!_

_And to think, Her Majesty will be family in just a few weeks. I do hope your father’s summer finery is still in good condition, he hasn’t needed it in so long. I may have to convince him to buy some new things._

_Sophia, I think, is a little cross with you. You know how she gets when she feels that she’s been left out of something. Don’t worry yourself about her, though; I’m sure she will come around._

_Well, this summer is certainly turning out much more interesting than I thought. Do write back quickly. If I don’t hear from you I’m sure we will have time to catch up when we arrive to the capital._

_With love,_

_Mother_

“I don’t understand.” Joshua’s sitting on the heavy wooden desk that’s pushed to the very back of his store, face pale and eyes looking wide and dark against his skin. “What do you mean, you two are getting married?”

Vernon and Seungkwan exchange a quick glance. The store is hot and the air feels heavy, uncomfortable. “We… we can explain,” the prince hedges, and Vernon lets himself drop into one of the chairs standing near the shelves.

“Please do.” Joshua threads his fingers together on his lap and sits, waiting. His raven nips at his earlobe from its spot on his shoulder, and Vernon eyes it warily.

Seungkwan rocks his weight from foot to foot. He’s back in his casual clothes, and when he crosses his arms grumpily he looks every bit like one of the grandmas in the capital, haggling with a fishmonger. “I never wanted to marry Seungcheol, is the thing.”

Joshua twitches, a little, and his eyebrows sink just a degree above his eyes. “…Alright?”

“We were engaged, like, years ago,” Seungkwan insists, wringing his hands. “And we were always friends but not that close, and never, like, _romantic_ , or anything. So,” he continues, face flushed with what looks like worry, “I wanted to help you.”

“Help me?” Joshua blinks, and looks taken aback. The raven hops off his shoulder and flies over to its normal perch on the top of Joshua’s cash register where it continues to stare at Vernon. “What do you mean?”

Seungkwan steps forward carefully, just once. “You like Seungcheol, right? He’s handsome, and nice, and strong, and all that.” He blusters forward when Joshua makes a shocked noise. “Everyone likes Seungcheol, it just makes sense that you would too.”

“What the prince is trying to say,” Vernon interjects, resting his elbows on his knees because his life just seems to have gotten so tiring lately. “Is that he thinks this all has to do with the soul reading you got at the lunar celebration.”

Joshua looks back at Seungkwan at that, and now a thin red flush is overtaking the paleness of his cheeks. “What? What do you mean?”

Seungkwan huffs loudly and dramatically. “Oh, don’t give me that. You’ve thought so too, haven’t you?” Joshua just flushes redder, which only gives Seungkwan more steam to continue on. “She said that something amazing was coming for you, something that would change your life. Almost immediately after all that you met Seungcheol, and I _saw_ the way he looked at you.”

“What – what way?”

“Oh, don’t do that.” Seungkwan points a very regal finger at Joshua. “You saw it too. He’s _smitten_ , Joshua, he must be, and I can’t get in the way of that! It works perfectly, too! He’s being re-stationed in the West soon and you said just a few weeks ago that you were thinking about moving back West.”

Joshua’s mouth twists into a frown. “You can’t be sure about any of this. And you certainly can’t just change the entire course of your life for _me,_ your Highness.” He ignores the frown that the use of his title earns him from Seungkwan. “Or Vernon’s, for that matter.”

Vernon straightens in his seat, uncomfortable at being put on the spot. “Ok, um, this isn’t my fight.”

“It should be.” Joshua shoots him look over his shoulder, one eyebrow cocked. “You just agreed to marry into the royal family. Have you even though about what that entails?”

Seungkwan makes a frustrated noise in the back of his throat. “It’s not that big of a deal, he already lives in the castle.”

“You can’t think it’ll be that simple.” Joshua retorts. “This marriage involves a restructuring of two entire families, not to mention an overhauling of everything Vernon’s probably ever known about his future. You were going to return to the West after all this, right?”

Vernon opens his mouth to respond but Seungkwan cuts in. “He didn’t want to just take over his father’s position, stuck in an office all day. The South is perfect, he already knows the language and the culture and everything. He’ll do so much better here.”

“As a public figure? A _royal_ public figure, at that? I don’t care how lax you’ve been playing with these rules, your highness, the public will have opinions about a foreign low-noble coming in and marrying the only son of their royal family.” Joshua’s shoulders are tense, and he’s gripping the edge of the desk on either side of his legs. “Not to mention you’re just cutting off any other options he has for a future. What if he was to meet someone? Would you just let him duck out of this whole agreement if he met someone he was _smitten_ with?” His wording is a cruel imitation of the prince, and his voice sounds thin and thready, as if it may snap any moment.

“Vernon gets all of this.” The prince’s tone has hardened into stone. “Whatever happens, we’ll handle it. You should be thankful, you know.”

“I never exactly asked for you to do this, did I?”

“Maybe not, but – “

Vernon stands up abruptly, the scrape of the legs of his chair cutting through the prince’s words. “I’ll let you all hash this out on your own, huh?” He grabs his bag and slings it onto his shoulder, eyes skipping away from Seungkwan’s and towards the floorboards. “Considering I can’t get a word in edgewise anyways.”

He brushes by the prince on his way outside and doesn’t turn around at the surprised noise he makes.

It’s another hot day outside. The bright sun above him and the thickness of the humid air sends Vernon wandering, almost without realizing it, towards the docks and the sound of crashing waves. Joshua’s shop is just on the edge of the shipping district, and so he only walks for maybe twenty minutes before he emerges out of a back street and onto a strip of wooden docks of varying sizes.

He walks past some of the larger ones, where huge shipping freights are pulled up and being unloaded and reloaded. When he gets past those the docks grow smaller, and eventually the road he’s on turns into a rougher, narrower path. He passes by a few older fishermen, who eye him curiously. He wonders, offhand, what their reaction would be if he saw them in a month or so.

Finally, Vernon turns idly down a rickety wooden dock. There’s only one boat tied up to this one, a smaller one that looks like it’s used mainly for fishing. He stands for a second, looking out onto the ocean. The waves roll lazily, looking almost like the way that a field of tall grass shivers under a gentle breeze.

He treads out to the end of the pier, feeling the wood shift a little under his feet but not enough to make him nervous about the structure of the dock. He can feel his skin tightening in the way that means he may be redder than usual tomorrow, but he honestly can’t bother to care right now. He sits down, setting his bag and sandals next to him and swinging his bare feet to hang just inches above the top of the water.

After a moment, Vernon slips his hand underneath the collar of his shirt and tugs out the necklace that he’s starting to wear. Up until recently it had stayed tucked in one of his trunks, buried underneath his things, but. The dream had shaken him, strangely. The sensible side of Vernon’s mind knew that there was nothing special about starting to wear his mother’s necklace at this point, but the superstitious side that the South had started to bring out in him wasn’t too sure.

Some gulls cry out above him, and the sound makes him ridiculously homesick, out of nowhere. Other than Joshua’s raven the only birds here seem to be varieties of the seagulls that circle him now – none of the hunting hawks back home, or the fat pigeons that he used to tell his sister she looked like when she still had her chubby kid cheeks.

Vernon watches the waves roll under his feet, letting the sun burn the back of his neck, until time passes and he feels the dock rock underneath him with movement. He doesn’t turn, just lets Seungkwan carefully approach and then sit down on his side.

They stay in silence for a while, Vernon’s eyes stuck on the water and certainly not catching now and then on how slender Seungkwan’s ankles look from where they hang next to his.

Then, Seungkwan sighs. “I’m sorry.” Vernon twitches a little but doesn’t reply, just raises his eyes to look at the prince. He looks entirely shame-faced, which twinges something in Vernon’s gut. “I was being a brat, I know.” He ducks his eyes, and his eyelashes catch against his cheeks. “I apologized to Joshua, if that makes anything better.”

Seungkwan looks back out over the ocean. “I’m, um. I’m sorry if I made you feel compelled to agree to this.” His voice is soft, in a way that Vernon isn’t accustomed to it sounding. “I guess… I’m already used to this life, you know? I didn’t think about how it would be for you, to adjust to all of it.” He waves his hands a little. “The glamour, and all that.”

Vernon snorts, which makes Seungkwan perk up a bit and look over at him. “I wouldn’t exactly call what you do ‘glamourous’.”

Seungkwan pouts, although his eyes look relieved and he leans a little closer to Vernon. “Well, it’s definitely different, right? Then it is in the West?”

Vernon shrugs. “Yeah, I mean, of course it is. You’d feel out of your element there, too. All the snow and practically no sun, sometimes. And with your Western as bad as it is, I’d have to be your translator practically all the time.” Seungkwan makes an affronted noise and Vernon can’t help but smile at it. “It is different here, though. I won’t pretend that it’s not, or that I don’t miss home.”

Seungkwan blinks. “Do you? We can absolutely take as many trips there as you need.” He rushes the words out, pushing into Vernon’s space the way he’s started to do these days when he gets worked up about something. “I was kidding, mostly, about never wanting to leave the South. I don’t want to, like, trap you here.”

“I know.” Vernon doesn’t think about it too hard, just casually props the hand closest to Seungkwan palm-up on his thigh. “I still have to show you snow, anyways.”

After a moment the prince follows his lead and carefully takes his hand, pushing their fingers together in a way that has become strangely familiar. “Of course you do.” He sighs a little, breathy and soft, and leans a bit firmer against Vernon’s side. “I wasn’t kidding, though, earlier. About me not losing anything with this.”  

Vernon lets himself tip his cheek down so it rests against the top of the prince’s head. His hair is warm under the sun, and smells like saltwater. “I know. Same for me, you know.”

Seungkwan squeezes his hand and laughs a little. “Jinseol always said I ran around too much to really fall in love with anyone.” His laugh turns bitter, and Vernon tamps down the urge to move his hand so he can wrap an arm around Seungkwan’s side and pull him closer. “Honestly, this is probably the best arrangement I can hope for.”

 

_Brother,_

_You’ll notice that I didn’t add an endearment onto your address. I think you probably can understand why. You’re getting_ married? _To the_ prince? _I hope you don’t think that you tricked me with that letter – I can tell that you’re not saying everything that’s going on. And even if I couldn’t, I would know anyways, because I’m your sister. There’s no way you just decided to marry him. You’re too reserved for that kind of romantic gesture._

_You realize you’re the ‘other woman’ now, right? Getting between the prince and his intended? I don’t care how noble you probably think you’re being, you’re in for a world of trouble. And not just from me when I get down there and have the chance to hit you myself._

_The really funny thing is, I thought for sure that half the reason you were going to the South was to escape Mother trying to marry you off. If only she knew that you leaving would just make the whole process faster! I guess if nothing else, the prince has already proven that he can stand you and your boring books._

_Speaking of, you better still be writing in that journal for me. Maybe have the prince add his own entries – actually, you should tell the prince to write to me. I have some questions for him._

_Your reluctant sister,_

_Sofia_

 

When news of the change in wedding plans gets out to the rest of the capital the castle suddenly doubles in occupancy. At least, it feels that way every time Vernon has to duck around another servant carrying a teetering pile of bedding on their way to prepare the newest guest room for visitors. Some of them he never meets; random ministers, cousins of cousins that even Seungkwan doesn’t know the names of, and people like that. Others, however, he is quickly introduced to.

“Of course you have to meet Soonyoung, you’re my _fiancé_ , don’t try to get out of this.”

“I’ll meet him eventually,” Vernon insists, managing to stand still despite the grip Seungkwan has on his hand where he’s trying to pull him down the hallway. “I told Mingyu I’d eat with him today, he’s gonna think I abandoned him.”

Seungkwan sniffs and rounds on him. “You can see him any old time, and Soonyoung hasn’t been in the capital for _ages_. He’s going to be in the wedding, you should meet him before that.”

Vernon only barely keeps from rolling his eyes. “You can try telling Mingyu that, then. He gets pouty when he’s abandoned, he’s like my hunting dogs back home.”

He ends up getting pulled into the lunch, of course, and gets all but tackled by the weedy son of the finance minister that he’s heard about since his first day on the island. Soonyoung has all the energy of the prince and possibly more, and the way they bend their heads together when the talk lowly to each other makes Vernon a little nervous for what they could accomplish combining all that energy. He can certainly imagine pint-size versions of them skipping classes to climb all the trees on the castle grounds.

“So,” Soonyoung asks at one point during the meal, cheeks bulging out with food and eyes peering curiously at Vernon from across the table. “What was it about my good friend His Highness that you were so infatuated with? Was it is his habit of falling asleep into books? The way he leaves orange peels in every corner of his rooms? Or just his good looks?” Soonyoung punctuates the sentence by reaching over and pinching Seungkwan’s cheek, only to receive a slap on the hand in return.

Vernon snickers, ducking his eyes down to look at the rippling surface of his tea. “All of it, I guess?” He laughs a little more when Seungkwan flaps a hand at him, playing up being flattered. “I guess the good looks helped balance out all the rest of it.”

Soonyoung laughs loudly, eyes curved up into half-moons and head flying back. “I like you already,” he says between pants for breath, grinning at him. “You’ll be a good addition to the family.”

The prince makes a huffy face and turns to Soonyoung. “Don’t you forget, you’re _my_ best friend. Please don’t try to steal my fiancé for your own.”

Soonyoung turns his smirk to Seungkwan and shrugs, cavalier. “I just can’t help myself, Kwannie. Don’t worry your pretty head about it, though, your best friend has himself a _suitor_.”

The prince squawks loudly and the two of them spend the rest of the meal gossiping passionately about the heir to a large Southern trading family who has, apparently, been chasing after Soonyoung for the last half-year.

When lunch is over Vernon excuses himself delicately, and while Seungkwan just waves a bit at him from where he appears to be determined to remain and talk to his friend, Soonyoung heaves himself up and walks over to Vernon.

Soonyoung claps a hand on Vernon’s shoulder, a bit stronger than he expected, and levels a look at him. “It is nice to meet you, you know.” His voice has gone serious, and Vernon feels himself flush a little at the unexpected change in tone. “I’ve known His Highness since we were the smallest brats throughout the entire capital. I’m just, y’know, glad he’s happy.”

Vernon leaves the two behind him, and Nayoung waits until they make it back to his rooms to delicately ask if he needs any burn balm for the red that’s flushed all throughout his cheeks and the back of his neck.

Overlapping voices and words echo through the back of Vernon’s head for the next few days. There’s Soonyoung and Mingyu, insisting on how much happier the prince has been since Vernon came to the castle. There’s the queen, remarking how it took Seungkwan 22 years to find someone to spend his life with. There’s even his mother, and the ghost of her voice through the letter she sent, all hesitant but positive.

And there’s Seungkwan, voice bitter and breaking at the edges. _“Honestly, this is probably the best arrangement I can hope for.”_

Seungkwan, warm and hopeful. _“I don’t see how I’m losing anything.”_

Seungkwan, hazy as a dream with the sun lighting a fire in his hair and his gaze strong. _“I know you can do it.”_

 

Weeks pass and more guests arrive. The wedding is so soon that it seems unreal, the pieces not quite fitting together in Vernon’s mind. His family is set to sail into port in just a few days, Sofia in tow, and Seungkwan has been having minor fits the past few days over it all.

“What if they don’t like me?” He asks Vernon, tone harried and stressed as he paces a hole through the rugs in his personal quarters while Vernon eats an orange at his table and watches, bemused. “I’ve always heard that mothers-in-law are supposed to hate their son’s fiancé, do you think your mother will hate me?”

Vernon snorts. “I doubt it. My mother’s happy enough with just the fact that I’m finally settling down. She’ll be double star-struck that it’s with a prince.”

Seungkwan scowls, and his robes swirl in a crimson wave as he twists on the ball of his foot to pace back the other way. “I’m just not used to having to impress people. Well, I mean, I do,” he corrects himself, in response to Vernon’s incredulous snort. “It’s just that Southern people are usually impressed by me no matter what I do, and either way it doesn’t matter much what they think of me. It’s Jinseol that has to do most of the impressing.”

“Don’t think so hard about it.” Vernon tosses the last bit of peel onto the small mountain he’s been constructing next to one of Seungkwan’s books, an old thing he borrowed from Joshua’s store after the two of them tentatively made up the other day. “Just be yourself.”

“I hope you realize that’s awful advice.” Seungkwan spins once more, this time to face Vernon. “I just, I’ve never really worried this much about what other people think of me.” His wrings his hands together, his nervous habit that Vernon recognizes clearly now.

“It’ll be fine.” Vernon grins at him, trying to project as much optimism as possible. The prince looks like he may fall over any second now, he’s strung so tight.

Someone at the door knocks all of a sudden, which only serves to make Seungkwan spin to face it and wind even tighter. “Yes?”

The door slides open, and Eunwoo peeks into the room. There’s something wry and knowing about the slant to her mouth, and she raises an eyebrow at the two of them. “Please, if I’m interrupting something, just let me know.”

Seungkwan huffs at her. “Oh, stop. What is it?”

Eunwoo straightens and clears her throat. “You two are wanted in the main courtyard, we’re receiving the delegation from the Eastern kingdom in just a few minutes.”

Vernon scrambles up as Seungkwan starts, surprised. “Already? I thought they weren’t due to sail in for a few more days.”

Eunwoo shrugs, and twists at the ends of the two long braids that she has her hair pulled into. “I guess they miscalculated the length of the trip? Or they just had good weather. Either way, they’re almost here, and Jinseol is freaking out that you two aren’t there yet.”

Seungkwan glances at Vernon and he can see the panicked light in his eyes. Vernon carefully takes the prince’s hand and squeezes, and almost immediately the tension drains away from his spine. Eyes still caught on Vernon’s, the prince swallows and nods.

“Alright, ok, take us to them.”

The main courtyard opens up into the largest pair of gates letting into the castle compound. It’s where the lunar celebration was held, which seems like ages ago to Vernon. The queen and Jinseol are already there, accompanied by a handful of higher-level servants. Nayoung is there too, and she gives Vernon a terse nod from her position.

Jinseol turns to them as they approach and she sighs in relief, hands fluttering up to fix Seungkwan’s collar and tug at one of his earrings, straightening out the dangling opals that had gotten tangled with each other. “We have to be on our best behavior, ok? We have slightly… tense dealings with the East right now. We’re already lucky that they agreed to send their first son and his court with him to the wedding on such short notice.”

“Of course.” Seungkwan eyes her, brow furrowed. “Are you alright?”

Jinseol’s mouth twists but she just pats on Seungkwan’s chest, and then gives Vernon a quick arm squeeze as well. “Of course I am, don’t be silly. Now straighten up, they’re on their way.”

After an awkward moment of not really knowing where to stand, Vernon moves to the spot behind Seungkwan’s shoulder that Eunwoo points him to. Just like Jinseol said, they’re only standing there in silence for a few moments before the gates are opened and five horses pull their carriages through them and into the courtyard.

The servants bustle over to help down the people sitting inside and unload the trunks, and Vernon rocks up onto his toes to get a better look at them as they approach. It’s just one member of the royal family – the first son, Jinseol had said – and so he’s only accompanied by a small number of guards and servants.

The prince himself is handsome, Vernon notices absentmindedly, tall and slender with good cheekbones and dressed impeccably in Southern clothing. He strides towards them on long legs, all excitement and looking nothing like he just spent several days on a boat.

“Your Majesty!” He greets them in slightly-accented Southern, and bows perfectly when he finally reaches them. “As always, it is a pleasure to see you.”

“And you, Prince Junhui.” The queen smiles at him, although her eyes stay just a bit steely. “Are you just as much a flatterer as your younger brother?”

Prince Junhui laughs brightly. “I only hope to reach those heights, your Majesty.” He turns to Jinseol and bows deeply to her, and then to Seungkwan as well. “Princess Jinseol, Prince Seungkwan. It’s a pleasure to finally make your acquaintance.”

Jinseol smiles and holds out a hand, letting Prince Junhui take it and press a perfunctory kiss to the back of her hand, as is customary in the East. “I’m so glad that you made it safely to our city.”

“Of course, of course.” Junhui smiles charmingly at her, and then turns more fully to Seungkwan, and Vernon by association. “And a very happy congratulations on your upcoming marriage, I’m sure it will be a beautiful ceremony.”

Seungkwan lets Junhui take his hand as well. “Thank you, we’re so flattered that you took the time to travel all the way down to be here for it.” He makes a rough motion, just a little, behind his back, and Vernon quickly takes a step forward. “This is my fiancé, Sir Choi Vernon of the Western Kingdom.”

“It’s an honor, your Highness,” Vernon demurs, and bows to Junhui.

“Oh, don’t do that.” The Eastern prince tsks at them, waving his hands in front of him. “This is an occasion for happiness and love, not stodginess and politics. We should learn to never let those things involve themselves in moments of romantic celebration.”

“Right.” Seungkwan laughs a bit, and continues what sounds like a very polite conversation with the other prince. Vernon lets his gaze wander, sensing that his attention isn’t really needed at this time.

He eyes the small gaggle of Eastern servants who have gathered behind the prince and his guards. Most of them seem to look just generally wide-eyed, staring around at the castle and the foreign sights and murmuring to each other quietly. Vernon’s eyes catch on the only one who isn’t looking around.

He’s looks young, his eyes cold and his form lithe, and he stands like he’s prepared to spring into action at any second. For a moment Vernon thinks he’s one of the guards, but he’s dressed in the same uniform as the rest of the servants. His stance reminds Vernon vaguely of the way that Sofia learned to stand back when she took dance lessons, that type of readied action and suggestion of grace.

And, while the rest of the servants and handmaids gawk at the exterior wall and the architecture of the castle, this one is staring directly at Princess Jinseol.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again with the apologies for the wait - more school. However! This is the second to last chapter, and the next one SHOULD be out by Saturday - I have part of it written already and the rest is all planned, it just has to be put to words. These are kind of rollercoasters of chapters, but I hope you all like them.
> 
> Also! I just made a new twitter, so please follow me at ponyoprince and say hi! I really need friends lol, and it's the place to be if you like fic updates/head canons/me being ridiculous about kpop.

During one of their first lessons, back when Vernon was still tiptoeing around the boundaries between His Highness Boo Seungkwan and the brat in nice robes that he would come to know, Seungkwan had sketched out a rough flowchart of the various foreign relations of the neighboring kingdoms in this side of the world.

“You see, they don’t teach you these kinds of things in your Western schools,” the prince had tutted at him as he scribbled out the names of the Northern royal family. “It’s so Western-centric up there, isn’t it? You never learn anything about the islands, or how we deal with our Eastern border, or anything.”

Vernon just shrugged and leaned forward over the table to get a better look at the messy piece of parchment that Seungkwan was working his way through. “It seems kind of complicated.”

“Of course it is.” Seungkwan shot him a stern look and circled the section of the parchment that represented the eastern-most islands of the Southern kingdom, a scattering of small dots just off the coast of the Eastern mainland. “This is why we have the best navy in the world. We have a lot of coastline to look after.”

He spread a line of dots between the islands and the Eastern kingdom, represented by a rough rectangle that was shaded in with suggestions of mountain ranges and lakes. “We historically have kind of rough relations with them. For a while they really liked to try to take over our eastern islands, kind of just to see if we let them get away with it. Obviously we didn’t, but that’s another story.”

Seungkwan rolled his eyes and drew a few lines that ended up forming into a short family tree. “Basically, what ended up happening a few decades ago was the crown prince died very young, and when there was no one else to take up the throne it got shunted around to a smaller family. The new king didn’t have the kind of military background that the old royal family did, so he ended up getting advised into forming peaceful relations with us. Really, it was in their best interests.” He paused for a second to push his hair out of his eyes and start in on another orange. “They need to be in our good favor any time they want to trade to us, and we’re the only way they ever get anything to other continents.”

Vernon hummed in understanding and tapped his pen against the table, watching as Seungkwan expertly peeled the fruit’s skin off in one long, curling strand. “So things are pretty solid between you and the East now, I guess?”

Seungkwan popped a segment of orange in his mouth and took a second to chew, head tilting to the side in thought. “Mostly. From what I understand from mother and Jinseol it’s a little rocky, but things are better now than they have been in centuries. It’s definitely nothing like that one time they tried to poison a whole shipment of grain that they were sending to the capital back when my great-great-grandmother was queen.” He laughed brightly when Vernon just blinked at him, face blank, and shoved the parchment out of the way to get a fresh sheet. “Oh, I _have_ to tell you about that, it was _hilarious._ She wrote in her memoir that she could never look at a loaf of bread the same way again.”

 

After the Eastern royal contingent arrives it seems like the flood gates are opened, and Vernon’s at the front of the castle greeting guests every day. Most are high-ranking Southern families in the trading or military sectors, with just a few servants between them, and they aren’t all staying on the royal compound but it still feels more full than it could possibly be in the last few days leading up to the wedding. Seungkwan grows twitchier and twitchier, when they actually have a few seconds to spare alone – any time he’s in front of guests he reverts instantly to his prince performance.

It’s really telling, Vernon guesses, that he knows now when Seungkwan’s putting on that face.

“The Eastern prince wants to kill me, I think,” Seungkwan hisses at Vernon one day. They’ve ducked into Vernon’s rooms in between a greeting with a visiting family and some inscrutable (at least to Vernon) meeting about flower arrangements. “He just keeps smiling at me with those teeth of his.”

“Teeth?”

“You know.” Seungkwan bares his teeth in what barely passes for a grin – he looks more like a rabid dog. “Teeth. He’s just always smiling, it’s strange.”

“He seems like a nice guy?” He does. Vernon doesn’t see the visiting royalty as much as Seungkwan does but Prince Junhui just grins and greets him whenever they pass each other in the courtyards. “I think you’ve been reading too much about sharks. It’s messing with your understandings of human culture.”

Seungkwan swats him on the arm, although it doesn’t do much damage. “You’ve gotten so cheeky lately.” He puffs his cheeks out and crosses his arms, the silky fabric of his robes shifting smoothly with the movement. “What happened to the sweet, suggestible tutor who first moved here? I miss him, tell him that he should come back. I don’t like my current model.”

Vernon can’t help but jab a finger at the prince’s chest. “So! You were just taking advantage of me being the new kid, weren’t you? With all that ‘we can just teach each other things’ at the beginning of everything.”

Seungkwan smiles sweetly at him. “You really didn’t fight me too much about it. Were you just too starstruck by my presence?” He does some wiggly hand gesture in front of his face. “I understand, you know, I’m very glamourous”

“Very glamourous.” Vernon flicks at the dangling gold band on Seungkwan’s ear lightly. “If you’re like this on a normal day what’ll they put you in for the wedding?”

He only notices it because they’re standing barely a foot apart, but Seungkwan’s sly smirk slips at that. He recovers it almost instantly, though, and twitches his head to the side. “You’ll just have to wait and see – it’s very bad luck to see your intended before the ceremony.” He laughs, and it almost sounds right, but something hits a sour chord in Vernon’s gut when he hears it.

“Right.” Vernon carefully draws his hand back from where it was still hanging in the air just inches away from the prince’s jaw and tucks it into his pocket. “I’ll look forward to that, then.”

Seungkwan steps away to kneel down and rummage through some of the papers on Vernon’s low table, and he takes in a careful breath that Vernon only notices it because of the way his shoulders move. “Now, we need to finalize your end of things for the religious portion of the ceremony. I’m going to have all the Southern rites of bonding and everything, of course, but we need to sort out you and all your archaic language.”

Vernon doesn’t move immediately, and so after a moment Seungkwan shifts and glances over his shoulder at him, eyebrows raised. “Are you going to help at all, or am I supposed to just make all this up?”

For that second, Vernon feels like he’s standing on an iced-over street that’s sloped at just enough of an angle that he can’t tell if he’s about to slide or not. The prince’s eyes are round and clear but he can’t un-hear the wrong note in his laugh earlier, or the way his smile had dimmed when Vernon had tapped at his earring. For that second, for all that Vernon had thought that he had come to know the prince to a deep degree over the past few months, he can’t read his thoughts at all.

Then – “Yeah, no, I’ll help.”

 

Ever since the one dream – the one that had barely faded at all in his memories, the one that kept the feeling of the heat of Seungkwan’s arms around his waist playing in the back of his head from time to time – Vernon had slept like the dead every other night. He was surprised, mostly, but was grateful at the same time. His days were busy enough that it was nice to be able to rely on a few solid hours of not thinking about anything during the nights.

Because, oh. If he never had to be involved in another wedding in his life it would still be too many.

His family arrives the day before the wedding. Sofia spends the entire first hour that he’s with them firmly ignoring him. She sits at the table where Vernon awkwardly sidesteps questions from his mother about Seungkwan with her arms crossed at her chest, jaw set stubbornly and eyes squinting steely at him.

Finally, she deigns him with her first words, and it’s just: “You look like a lobster. Is this just what you look like all the time, now, or did you spend a particularly long time outside with your _fiancé_ yesterday?”

His dad shoots her a disapproving look but Vernon snorts into the cup of tea he had raised as a desperate attempt to get out of answering his mom’s question about what he and Seungkwan were thinking regarding children. “I just kind of look like this now,” he finally gets out, after sputtering tea half-out of his nose for a moment. “I can’t get away from the sun, it’s everywhere here.”

Sofia gives him an unimpressed stare and raises her nose a little higher into the air. It’s such a Seungkwan pose that Vernon almost can’t handle it. “And you’re positive that you want to live here forever, now?”

He mulls that over. Sof grew up, at some point, Vernon realizes in the back of his mind. He’s missed that. She’s in a lightweight Western dress right now, her hair pulled up off her neck with a ribbon, looking bizarrely more like a lady than the short kid he had left months ago. Maybe it’s just the distance, and the way that the past few months have seemed like years compressed into a shorter time, but he’s struck with the thought of her being on her own in the West.

That, more than any of the careful promises he’s made to Seungkwan, or the formal bow he gave the queen when she accepted their proposal, confirms what he had already been suspicious of. He’s really made up his mind, about all of this.

It settles his stomach. “Yeah, Sof.” She gives him a sharp look, no doubt directed at the nickname that she started to whine about ever since she turned ten and thought herself all grown. “I think I’m positive.” Vernon waits a beat for her to start to fuss, before cracking into a grin. “You’ll visit, though, right? After all, I still need to bring you to the dragons at the other islands. They’ll love you.”

She squawks and almost knocks over her untouched cup of tea when she lunges forward to smack him on the shoulder, and he can’t _wait_ to introduce her to Seungkwan.

Seungkwan loves her, predictably enough. “She _adorable_ , she has your face,” he gushes that night, cheeks bulging a little around the last bits of his rice from the dinner they were served in Seungkwan’s quarters. “Or, you both have your parents’ faces, I suppose. Either way I love her, she’s so funny.”

Vernon smirks and leans back on his hands. “You would say that, you didn’t have to grow up with her.” He nods when Seungkwan makes a move towards the bits of sashimi that Vernon didn’t eat. “She is cute, though, and I think you’ll grow on her. I wouldn’t worry about it.”

Seungkwan sniffs and delicately lifts one of the paper-thin pieces of fish off of Vernon’s plate with his chopsticks. “Who said I was worried?”

Vernon grins wider. “You stuttered all over your words when she made those faces at you, earlier. I’ve never heard you fall flat on so many jokes in such a short span of time before.”

The prince kicks at Vernon’s crossed legs under the table, chewing furiously on the fish before swallowing. “Well, you’re right. I’m sure it’s just a matter of time before she realizes that I’m a much better brother than you – I have twice the number of sisters you do, after all. I have better experience.”

“Hah, of course.” Vernon watches, full and content, as Seungkwan finishes off the last few pieces of sashimi and settles back to sip at his tea. “Speaking of sisters, the wedding’s tomorrow – shouldn’t we be having some big ceremonial dinner the day before it, or something? With the families, and everything?”

“Oh.” Seungkwan just shrugs lightly, and sets his cup back down on the table. “We don’t really do that. The night before a wedding is supposed to be, like, peaceful, you know? It’s supposed to be time for the couple to settle down together and just reflect over their relationship, and everything.” His cheeks go a little red, and he looks down at his empty plate to poke at it with a chopstick. “There’s a big spiritual thing about the final pre-marriage, um, consummation of the relationship, too. So we usually leave engaged couples alone the night before the wedding.”

Vernon just blinks. “Uh. Consummation?”

Seungkwan goes even redder, his face clashing horribly with the deep scarlet collar of his outer robe that he pulled back around his shoulders when the chill of the night seeped down the halls of the castle. “Don’t pretend like you don’t know the word, your Southern is fine.”

“No, I know, just – that’s a thing? Religiously?”

“Yeah, I guess.” Seungkwan shrugs again, twitchier this time, and folds his hands around his teacup. “There are certain goddesses who prize the energy of un-bonded passion – it’s supposed to be more youthful and energetic. I guess. I don’t know,” he sputters, still not looking Vernon in the eyes. “Sojeong mentioned it a few times when she was going through all of her religious studies, but it’s more a superstition than anything.”

“Oh.” Vernon frowns as Seungkwan picks at a tiny chip in the lip of his cup. “We, uh, don’t really do that. The whole thing with marriage for us is that it’s what makes the relationship stable enough to endorse, um. Consummation. It’s kind of outdated but we still have parts in our usual ceremony that reference it, consummating the marriage the night after the ceremony and all that.”

Seungkwan finally looks at him, eyebrows twitching closer to each other. “You’re really supposed to wait until _after_ you’re already married for all that? That’s an awful idea!” His flush hasn’t receded but his hands are steadier on the teacup now. “What if it’s terrible, and you’re just stuck together? What if you don’t match at all, in that, um.” He waves his hands around vaguely. “In that whole domain. No wonder you have higher divorce rates than we do.”

Vernon huffs out a laugh. “I think it might have more to do with the long winters. You spend too many months snowed-in with the same person and you go a little stir-crazy.”

“Either way, apparently we deal with these things much more sensibly down here.” Seungkwan takes one last sip of his tea before setting the cup down decisively in front of him and nodding. “It’s always good to hear, that we’re doing well competitively on an inter-kingdom level.”

Vernon snorts and sits back as Seungkwan stands up to open the door to the hallway and poke his head out. “Eunwoo? We’re finished, I can help you clear the plates and everything.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” The handmaid bustles in, actually wearing her official royal uniform for once now that so many outside dignitaries have begun staying in the castle compound. “I can’t have you trying to steal my job, what if you do it better than me?”

Seungkwan tsks and helps her stack plates anyways. “You know that’s not a risk that you have to worry about. You saw me break that vase when I was sixteen and I was trying to help you dust. I thought that my old caretaker would actually faint, she turned so white.”

“It _was_ a very old vase,” Eunwoo replies, tone low and conspiratorially playful. “I don’t think she appreciated you and Soonyoung trying to glue it to back together as much as she could have, though. It was a nice thought.”

“And that’s what counts.” Seungkwan places the last cup on the tray Eunwoo had brought in and brushes his hands together. “Now you’re free! Go to bed, we both have early mornings tomorrow.”

Eunwoo straightens up with the tray and Vernon notices with a sinking feeling the mischievous spark in her eye that’s becoming more and more familiar the longer their engagement has dragged on. “You’re one to talk, your highness.” She props the tray on her hip and smirks at them. “Make sure you get plenty of rest, you two, you have a long day ahead of you.”

Vernon can’t help but grin as Seungkwan’s ears go quickly back to the bright red they were before. “You are awful,” the prince sputters, flapping a hand at Eunwoo. “Go, go, get out of here. I’ve seen your face too much tonight.”

Eunwoo leaves, cackling, and Seungkwan waits for the door to slide shut before wilting forward to bury his face in his arms on the tabletop. “She’s never going to let me live all this down. I swear, she’ll expect full details about everything tomorrow, she’s the worst.” His voice is muffled against the sleeves of his robes, but the plaintive note rings clear in the room.

Vernon shifts in his seat and coughs to clear his throat. “She’s really invested in all this, huh?”

“You have no idea.” Seungkwan raises his head a bit to prop his chin on his hands, looking forlornly into the distance. “She expected a complete play-by-play after my first kiss; I can only imagine how she’ll be for this.”

Vernon very carefully doesn’t ask who his first kiss was. Instead; “She’s that curious about all this, huh?” The prince glances at him and nods, and Vernon shoots him a wry smile. “So, she would probably notice if we slept in our separate quarters, then?”

There’s a beat of silence, and then the prince is turning his face back into his sleeves and letting out a low moan. “You’re _right_ ,” he says, tone distressed and low. “I didn’t even _think_ about that.”

“I mean,” Vernon says, shrugging and trying to seem much less hung up on all this than he actually is. “It’s not a big deal, right? If I just, um, sleep here?”

Seungkwan twists his head again to look up at Vernon. He has red marks on his cheeks from the folds of his sleeves, and Vernon definitely doesn’t reach out to brush his fingers against the slight indents. “Do you mind? It’s awful of me to expect that. Although, I guess we’ll be doing that after the whole marriage and everything anyways,” the prince seems to realize. “I can make sure to have extra blankets and things later on, but Eunwoo might be suspicious if I leave now to get some.”

“I don’t mind, if you don’t.” Seungkwan frowns, unconvinced, and Vernon continues on. “Really, I don’t. It’s just sleeping. As long as you don’t move around a lot or sleep talk or anything it’ll be fine.”

The prince gives him a long, searching look, before seeming to come to a conclusion. He straightens up and lets out a sigh, blinking up at the skylight in the ceiling of his room. Curious, Vernon glances up too. It must be later than he realized, because almost centered in the round window is the moon. It’s almost full but not quite, and hangs huge and yellow in the night sky.

After a moment of silence Seungkwan huffs and heaves himself off the floor. “Well,” he says, straightening his robes and pinning Vernon to his seat on the ground with a look. “Eunwoo was right – we have a big day ahead of us tomorrow.”

Vernon winds up borrowing some of the prince’s sleeping things, which end up being way less fancy than he had kind of been expecting. They basically fit, just a loose shirt and a pair of soft pants that Vernon figures are more of an autumn staple – they would have been way too hot in the peak of the summer, but they seem perfect now that the nights were turning just slightly brisk.

Seungkwan is fussing with the blankets at his bed when Vernon emerges, dressed and washed up, from his bathroom (which _is_ much fancier than Vernon’s own). “You know, it’s pretty late now,” he babbles, smoothing down a pillow. “I don’t think anyone would notice if I did run and get more blankets.”

“Seungkwan, it’s fine,” Vernon says lowly as he settles on the ground next to the prince, legs crossed. “Seriously, your bed’s way bigger than mine anyways, it’ll be alright.” It is – it’s maybe twice the size of the one in Vernon’s quarters, and that one had been comfortable enough anyways. “And I don’t know about you but I think I actually may pass out. Today was kind of crazy.”

Seungkwan stops fussing and turns to face him, eyes wide. “That’s right, you had to settle your family in and everything. We can just sleep now, then, let me get the lanterns.”

Vernon watches as Seungkwan scrambles up and over to the lights, and then makes a quick executive decision to just take the side of the bed closest to the wall of the room while the prince is blowing the candles out. The room goes dark quickly – without any windows, the darkness is so complete that it almost presses in on Vernon’s lungs.

He moves to lie down, and Seungkwan must be used to this level of darkness because he seems to find his way easily to the bed. There’s a short, awkward moment where they carefully navigate the space of the sheets between them, but soon enough Vernon settles back on the pillow that Seungkwan finally convinced him to take.

The sheets rustle as the prince shifts his position, and when he huffs out a breath the air sends goosebumps over Vernon’s skin. “Is it weird that I’m nervous for tomorrow, still?” More rustling, and Seungkwan must turn over onto his side because his voice sounds just a little closer when he speaks next. “Even though it’s, you know, not exactly real.”

“I dunno. I think it makes sense.” Carefully, Vernon turns his head so he’s facing the prince, and even with how dark it is there’s something charged about the couple inches of space he imagines are between them. “It’s a big moment, there’s a lot changing. I think it’s normal for there to be anxiety with that.”

Seungkwan sighs into the black of the room. “I guess.” He’s quiet for a moment, the room more silent than Vernon’s ever is because of how closed in it is. “Thanks, again. For all of this.”

Vernon grins, even though he knows the prince can’t see it, because there’s something shaken and fragile in the tone of Seungkwan’s voice that he wants to smooth over as quickly as possible. “You really need to stop that – I told you, it’ll work out. It’ll be perfect.”

The room is quiet again, just the sound of Seungkwan’s soft breathing for a long moment. It stretches for so much that for a moment Vernon thinks that he’s fallen asleep, but then a hand softly touches right at his sternum, on top of his shirt. “Yeah. It will be.”

 

Just like the past few nights, Vernon sleeps like the dead. It’s why it takes him so long to wake up the next morning, he figures. Rather than shooting awake right away it’s slow, gradual, like the thawing of spring.

He’s warm, is the first thing he thinks, warmer than he usually is. There’s no sea breeze through his window like there normally is, just still air and heat. He shifts, a little uncomfortable, and tightens his grip around the person’s waist that he’s in bed with.

That’s the second thing. He blames being tired and groggy, because nothing snaps into place right away. Instead, he curls his arm more completely around the person’s hips and tries to bury his face in the curve of their neck where it meets their shoulder.

The third thing is the soft, content noise that the other person makes from above his head. Vernon’s shifted down in the bed, apparently, enough to tuck his face under their chin and tangle their ankles together during the night. He tugs the person closer with the arm he has around their waist and that must jostle them just enough to wake them, because the next thing he knows the prince is pulling just a little away to peer down at him.

Vernon’s brain takes that as a cue to finally wake up completely, and he shifts to blink up at Seungkwan. The sun from the skylight in the other room sends faded light into this room, and it casts the prince’s face and hair in shades of sunrise pink and orange. His hair is mussed and sticking up on one side, and his cheeks are round from sleep.

He looks beautiful, and Vernon suddenly, desperately wants nothing more than to bury his face back in the soft skin at the bend of his neck and ignore everything else.

Needless to say, he doesn’t. Instead, the prince blinks sleepily down at him a few times before speaking, voice hoarse. “Good morning.”

“Good morning.”

Seungkwan blinks again at him, cheek squished on the pillow and eyebrows just a little furrowed. Vernon realizes a little belatedly that his hand is still on his hip, and the reminder makes him tighten his grip just a little, subconsciously.

They’re so close, on the same pillow at this point, and Vernon can clearly see the flecks of gold and amber in the prince’s eyes. They stay like that for what feels like a long, slow moment, time seeping golden and thick, before Seungkwan blinks one more time and seems to come fully awake.

“Right. Morning.” He shoots up and Vernon moves his arm at the last second to avoid getting yanked up in the movement. “Morning. We have to go, we have to get dressed, Eunwoo and the others will be here any second.” His eyes are harried when he looks down at Vernon.

Somehow it feels like the right thing to do, so Vernon just goes with it when his instincts tell him to sling his arm back across Seungkwan’s waist and pass a hand over the side of his ribs carefully. “It’s fine, take a breath.”

Seungkwan doesn’t for a moment, and instead just keeps staring down at Vernon, who still hasn’t moved to sit up at all. Finally, just when Vernon had been getting a little worried about an oxygen-deprived prince, he lets out a shuddery breath and swallows. “Right. Ok. Here we go, then.”

They get separated almost immediately when Eunwoo bursts into Seungkwan’s room mere minutes after they get up, Nayoung in tow.

“You’ll see him at the ceremony!” Eunwoo crows down the hall after them as Vernon gets pulled away by Nayoung. “Don’t worry, I’ll make sure he looks gorgeous.”

“It’s customary to not get ready together for the marriage ceremony,” Nayoung calmly explains as she hooks her arm through Vernon’s and leads him towards his own rooms. The only indication that she finds any of this amusing is a slightly upward tick of her mouth when she shoots him a sidelong look. “Besides, you two spent enough time together last night.”

“Is that just something that I should be prepared for everyone to ask about?” Vernon mutters. “Because it feels like something that everyone’s asking about.”

Nayoung just giggles at him and marches him back to his room, where a small gaggle of servants is waiting with what seems like express permission to completely undress him. He gets pushed to his washroom to completely clean up, and then is allowed to eat a simple breakfast while Nayoung lays out his clothes and gives him gentle reminders about the ceremony.

“You’ll be fine as long as you listen and go where they tell you to go,” she says at the end of it all. “It’s pretty self-explanatory. Most of it is just you standing and listening to the high priest speak for a while, I wouldn’t worry about it.”

“Is that what you tell everyone the morning of their weddings? Just don’t worry about it?”

Nayoung taps him on the forehead with the comb that she’s raking through his damp hair just a bit too hard to seem accidental. “It’s good advice. It’ll all be fine,” she continues, and parts his hair carefully, just enough to let the front strands flop over his forehead. “His highness will be happy with it no matter what.”

Vernon swallows, eyes crossing as he watches her work on his hair. “Right.”

After several long debates and near-arguments they had finally decided on putting Vernon in Western clothes for the wedding. Of the two of them Vernon had been more hesitant about it; Seungkwan, on the other hand, had just slapped his hand on the table and declared that Vernon was Western, and he looked handsome in Western clothes, so why shouldn’t he just wear them?

“It’s not like we’re trying to convince people you’re Southern,” he had stated, tone determined. “Why should they expect you to wear anything else?”

The prince had gotten his way, obviously, and Nayoung and the servants pull back to let Vernon dress himself for the most part. It’s nothing fancy, just a formal suit and a tie that’s maybe a little (a lot) nicer than anything that he would normally wear, even on business.

Nayoung pulls back in to help him with the tie, and Vernon lets her take over because his brain feels fried from overwork. “We have to head out soon, yeah?”

“That’s right.” She tightens it just enough to press at his throat before smoothing his jacket with her hands and stepping back. “Do you think you’re ready?”

He thinks about it for a second. His parents, sitting in the audience of the ceremony and wondering how their son ever accomplished something so ridiculous as marrying a prince. Sof, probably still a little bit furious at him.

Seungkwan, and the determined set of his jaw when he refused his engagement with General Choi weeks ago now.

“Yes. Yes, yeah, I’m ready.”

 

The ceremony is set up in one of the center-most courtyards of the castle. It’s blocked off on all sides by buildings, and isn’t really large enough to fit the number of people that they’re trying to fit in, but Vernon had been told it was mostly for security concerns. It was much easier to guard a closed-off space than one more open to the outside.

He gets bustled over through a back alley between two buildings, and is moved quickly to a small tent that had been set up just outside of the courtyard. He’s only a little surprised to see his dad there along with Mingyu, who’s actually dressed in formal robes for once and looks sharply handsome for it.

“There you are!” He claps Vernon on the arms cheerily. “I was almost worried you got a bad case of nerves and wouldn’t show.”

Vernon laughs a bit and carefully shrugs Mingyu’s hands off. “Well, no panicking, I’m here.” He glances at his dad, standing just past Mingyu, and grins a little shakily. “Is everyone excited?”

His dad steps up and takes him by the shoulders before shaking his head fondly and tugging him forward into a hug. “Your mother is already crying, and we managed to get Sofia to sit down by promising her extra dessert at the reception,” he says, and his own voice sounds rough with emotion too. “It will be a beautiful wedding.”

Vernon laughs and tightens his hold on his dad. “I hope so.”

“Sir Choi!” They both turn towards the entrance to see Jinseol ducking in, waving aside the servants who scramble to attend to her as she heads their way. “I’m sorry, Vernon. I’ll have to get used to dropping the formalities.”

He lets her take his hands and just look at him for a moment, eyes shining. Her hair is twisted up in complicated knots, and her eyes are cleanly lined in black. Her robes are more extravagant than ever, loose and billowy in the royal family’s shades of mint green and white and sea blue. “I only have a few moments to spare but I just had to come and greet you before the ceremony. You can’t imagine how excited I am,” Jinseol continues, clutching his hands tight in hers. “I knew I would be happy when my baby brother finally married, but to have it be for love – it just means so much more. I’m sure you know,” she says to Vernon’s father, who chuckles in agreement.

“That means a lot,” Vernon says, a little abashed at the bright light of Jinseol’s gaze. “I, um, look forward to joining your family.”

She grins wide, eyes curling almost identically to Seungkwan’s, and leans up to smack a kiss on his cheek loudly. “I have to go,” she says then, pulling back and making a forlorn face at him. “But the best of luck to you in the ceremony.” And with that Jinseol spins back out, robes falling cleanly around her figure in cool ocean tones.

Nayoung pulls him aside then to go over the combined Western and Southern vows that he and Seungkwan had figured out, and so he doesn’t notice the time passing until the servants start to mutter lowly amongst each other from the entrance of the tent.

“What’s going on?” Vernon mutters to Nayoung when she begins casting increasingly anxious looks towards them. “Is something wrong?”

“Not necessarily,” she starts, tone carefully even. “We’re just running a little behind schedule, I suppose, but that’s to be expected. It’s not a wedding if nothing goes wrong,” she jokes, but Vernon notices when it falls just a bit flat.

It ends up being another fifteen minutes before someone comes to the entrance of the tent, and Vernon immediately knows something’s happened when Eunwoo bursts through the crowd of servants. Her eyes are harried when they land on Vernon, and she hustles forward without greeting anyone else.

“Is there any reason that Seungkwan would disappear all of a sudden?” She hisses, just under her breath enough to prevent anyone from himself and Nayoung from overhearing.

Still, hearing her doesn’t mean it makes any sense. “What?”

Eunwoo is practically bouncing from foot to foot with anxiety. “Seungkwan. Prince Seungkwan, your fiancé, soon-to-be husband. He’s gone.”

“What do you mean, he’s gone?”

“He’s gone! Just, gone, completely.” She looks slightly terrified, and glances over at Nayoung. “I swear I was keeping an eye on him but you know how he is, he just slips out sometimes before anyone can notice.”

Nayoung’s gaze turns steely and she tugs the other two of them until they’re standing in a closed circle. “Does anyone else know that he’s disappeared?”

Eunwoo shakes her head frantically, her loose hair whipping against her shoulders. “No, I came straight here when I noticed. I didn’t want to raise a fuss by alerting the guards, not when there are so many politicians here.”

“Good.” Nayoung sighs and then turns to Vernon. “You don’t know anything, right? Where he would go?”

He just looks at her blankly for a moment, before something slides cleanly into place in the back of his mind. “Actually, um. I might.”


	8. Chapter 8

The observation tower is only a few buildings away from where they had Vernon’s tent set up, but he still finds himself nearly running on the way there. Nayoung had strictly instructed him not to mention why he was outside of the wedding grounds to anyone who would ask but clearly she had been overestimating the observation skills of most of the guests, because the handful of people that he’s passed by haven’t seemed to pay him any mind at all.

The tower itself looms taller than before, it seems, and Vernon takes a second to look up the side of it before shaking his head and starting up the incline to the top.

He makes it about three-fourths of the way up the ramp when he first hears the voices, and he immediately pushes into a run. They’re muffled until Vernon reaches the top of the ramp and bursts into the upper level of the tower, and he heads over to the open hatch to the top of the tower before freezing, one hand clutching a ladder rung already.

“Look, you made a mistake. Just put that down and we can figure something out.” Seungkwan’s voice, loud enough to be heard but thread-thin and shaking with some emotion – anxiety? Nerves.

Or, no.

Fear.

“There isn’t anything else to figure out.” That voice is unfamiliar, but the slightly accented Southern says enough to get Vernon to start pulling himself up the ladder, careful to not make a noise. “I can’t go back down there without having done anything. If your people don’t ruin me then mine will.”

“Now, let’s not go putting words in other people’s mouths!” Seungkwan is babbling the way he does when he’s nervous and just trying to fill up empty space with words, Vernon notes absently as he carefully pauses just out of sight below the hatch. “I’m the prince, if anyone can work you out a good plea deal it’s me.”

The other person laughs lowly, and there’s a desperate note in the sound that sends a chill down Vernon’s spine. “I don’t think that’s an option.”

He can’t stay still anymore, and so Vernon pulls himself up through the hatch as silently as possible. Once he gets a good view of the top of the tower he pushes himself up fully onto the roof, because it’s clear that no one has seen him.

On the other side of the roof a slim figure in the same uniform that the Eastern servants have been wearing for the past week has Seungkwan pinned to the rickety railing surrounding the top of the tower. He has one hand curled in the fabric of Seungkwan’s robes – almost identical to Jinseol’s in the exact same shades of mint and blue. The other hand is to Seungkwan’s throat, and the bright afternoon sun glints sharply off of something metallic in his grip.

Vernon’s stomach drops and he stays crouched low to the ground of the roof of the tower. The Eastern servant seems thin; the bones of his wrist are prominent through his skin as he tightens his grip on the knife that he has held to the prince’s throat.

Recognition clicks in the back of his mind. Vernon remembers seeing this one, back when Prince Junhui had first arrived to the castle. He had unnerved Vernon then, with the dark cast of his expression, but it’s nothing compared to how he looks right now.

Seungkwan’s face is half-obscured behind the servant, but he looks improbably more calm than Vernon thinks he should. “I’m not the one that they told you to go after, though. I’m right, aren’t I?” He scrabbles at the thin bars of the railing behind him, gripping them tightly and using the leverage to lean just a bit further away from the blade of the knife. “You thought I was Jinseol.”

There’s a pause, and Vernon takes the opportunity to shift slightly closer. The roof of the tower is just a thin ring of flooring around a pillar in the middle, and he puts his back to the stone of the pillar in an attempt to get any cover at all.

“So what.” The servant’s tone is flat, and he presses further against Seungkwan. “I still have one member of the royal family here, don’t I? I’d say I’m in a pretty good position, all things considered.”

“What do they have on you?” Seungkwan’s face is about as pale as it can get, and he licks his lips nervously. Vernon can see his eyes dart down to look at the knife. “Is it money? Because I’m sure we can work something out in that regard.”

“It’s not money. I’m not that easily bribed. I’m not that low, greedy for anything I can get.” The stranger’s voice is bitter and tense.

Seungkwan blinks, his hair blowing and catching on his eyelashes in the ocean breeze that’s strong and fast this high up. “So not just money, then. Let me guess – kidnapped girlfriend? Sick mother that you can’t afford to buy medicine for?”

The last guess makes the stranger press even closer to Seungkwan and the prince lets out a shaky laugh. “Right, ok, got it in two.”

“Don’t fucking talk like you know anything, your _highness_ ,” the stranger hisses. “You’ve never had anything to worry about. Would the world be any worse off if you were gone? You have no one depending on you – your whole family is filthy rich, aren’t they? What do they need you for?”

Seungkwan barks another laugh and the sound grates against Vernon’s nerves. He doesn’t like staying still like this, but any sudden moves and the knife that’s so close to the thin skin of Seungkwan’s throat could dig in just an inch more. “Do you really think that’s the right tactic to take on this one?”

A seagull cries out from above them but the stranger doesn’t move. “What are you talking about.”

“Killing me isn’t going to cause the kind of political shake up that they most likely want.” Seungkwan’s throat bobs nervously as he swallows, but his voice is steady when he continues. “Jinseol, yeah. With the crown princess gone we’d be struggling to fill the seat, between a religious figurehead and the youngest son who’s about to make a not particularly politically-advantageous marital move. The South would be scrambling, which is probably exactly what you all want, isn’t it?”

The stranger doesn’t reply, and Seungkwan barrels on. “So, you know. I’m not the crown princess. Maybe not killing me is more in your best interests?”

The wooden flooring of the walkway isn’t the most structurally-sound thing in the world, is the issue, and so when Vernon shifts his weight to his other leg from his position against the center pillar the floorboards creak just a little. The sound’s enough to send the stranger jerking in surprise, though, and Seungkwan’s eyes immediately lock onto Vernon from over the stranger’s shoulders.

There’s a split second where things are frozen and all Vernon can see is the mixture of shock and fear that ices over Seungkwan’s expression. The almost-teasing, nervous grin from just moments ago drops immediately, and instead he looks terrified.

Vernon’s pretty sure that he can relate to that.

The stranger cautiously releases his hold on Seungkwan’s robes but keeps the knife pressed to his neck, actually making contact with the skin now as he twists to look at Vernon. It is the servant from days ago – Vernon recognizes the determined cast of his eyes and the intense twist to his mouth. “Look who it is.”

Vernon slowly straightens up off the ground to his full height, keeping his hands by his sides. “I’m unarmed,” he carefully says, holding his open palms up for inspection. “But you should probably let go of the prince now.”

The servant bares his teeth in a growl and digs his arm into Seungkwan’s chest, knife steady. “Why exactly should I do that?” He looks young, Vernon realized – barely a year or two older than him, probably. “It seems like I have the advantage here.”

“Okay, but – the prince is right.” Vernon hesitantly takes a step forward, then stops when the servant pins him with a glare. “They ordered you to kill Jinseol – killing Seungkwan isn’t going to accomplish the same thing. They might refuse to give you what they promised you, and then you’ll just be left out on your own to be tried in the South. I doubt they’ll be particularly forgiving if you murder their prince.”

The servant’s mouth twists more in a grimace. “Neither of you understand,” he spits out. “I don’t care if I risk being jailed, or worse. I _have_ to try to get this antidote.” His voice goes suddenly scared, and his grip on the handle of the knife tightens, white-knuckled. “There’s no other option.”

Seungkwan glances at Vernon, eyes wild, the whites showing like a spooked horse. He cracks another smile, though, a sickly thing that betrays just how having the blade against his throat is affecting him. “Well, I’ve read a few medical texts in my days of schooling,” he says. “Maybe I can help your mother instead.”

The servant shoots Seungkwan a poisonous look. “You won’t be able to do anything. She has Eastern river fever – only the most elite Eastern families have access to the medicine for it, it’s that rare.”

The mention of the illness means nothing to Vernon – he’s never taken anything close to a medicine class – but the little color that was still in Seungkwan’s face drains at the name of it. “Eastern river fever? You’re sure that’s what it is?”

The stranger’s brows furrow more as he regards the prince. “I’m positive. What do you know about it?”

“That – I’m sorry.” Seungkwan stutters out. “It’s just. I think you’ve been lied to.”

“What?” The knife presses just a little closer to Seungkwan’s throat and the prince tips his head up further in an attempt to shy away from the pressure. “What are you saying?”

Seungkwan’s hands flutter on the bars of the railing behind him, trying to steady his grip. The railing isn’t that tall, only raising about halfway up his back before ending, and so he’s bent slightly backwards over it now. “It’s – there’s no antidote for Eastern river fever. At least, nothing that’s actively in use.” He swallows, eyes darting between Vernon and the servant. “I’m sorry, but it’s true.”

The wind whistles through the bars of the guard rail and Vernon watches as the stranger’s posture winds up tighter and tighter. “You’re lying.”

“I’m really, really not,” the prince stammers. “Why would I? Wouldn’t it make more sense to tell you that I had the antidote, and I would give it to you if you let me go? It’s not that. I think – I think whoever put you up to this is just trying to screw you over.” He pauses, and then says again, “I’m sorry.”

By now Vernon’s crept closer, only five feet or so away from the two of them pressed up against the guard rail, and he can see it clearly when the stranger’s hand around the hilt of the knife starts to shake. The stranger turns sharply, pins Vernon in place with a wild-eyed look, and then swivels back to face the prince.

“There’s – there’s no hope for her, then?” He demands. “Nothing?”

Seungkwan can’t move his head, there’s no give with how close the blade is to his neck, but his expression melts slightly into something sad. “Nothing. Certainly nothing that they would know about, anyways.”

The shaking of his hand increases, and Vernon winces when the blade finally nicks Seungkwan’s throat. It’s a shallow cut, thin and barely enough to raise blood to the surface, but the bright red against Seungkwan’s tan skin seems to jolt them both.

The servant lets out a shuddery breath and glances once more back at Vernon. “He’s not going to let me get away, is he.” It isn’t a question to the prince – his tone is too low and resigned, for all that his eyes are beginning to water up in frustration. Vernon doesn’t say anything in response. He just watches the movement of the knife, which has come to still again against Seungkwan’s skin.

Then, the stranger seems to come to a decision. He sets his jaw and levels the flat of his arm against Seungkwan’s chest. The sun is burning on the back of Vernon’s neck, now, but the feeling completely disappears when the stranger in one smooth movement shoves Seungkwan back against the railing and then takes off, moving to sprint past Vernon and towards the hatch leading down into the tower.

Seungkwan’s eyes meet Vernon’s for a split second, just enough time for the servant to rush past Vernon in a whip of air and for the metal of the railing to make a sickening, squealing crack.

Then, Seungkwan’s falling.

At first Vernon feels frozen to the ground. Seungkwan’s robes billow around him in a cloud of sea-tinted color, and the sun sets his hair on fire with reds and oranges. The railing buckles, rusted through at the hinges and brittle with age, and it gives under the force of Seungkwan’s weight, combined with the way the servant had pushed him further back.

Vernon’s stomach drops instantly, through his feet and off the tower. Then, finally, it’s like he regains control of his legs and he’s bolting forward to the edge of the walking path.

Somehow, miraculously, he manages to seize one of Seungkwan’s arms as Vernon falls forward flat onto his stomach on the floorboards of the path. He has to strain to clutch onto him, made even more difficult with the slippery fabric of Seungkwan’s robes and the way that the prince’s weight hangs off of the edge of the tower.

He hasn’t looked away from Seungkwan’s face yet this entire time and the prince’s eyes are huge and terrified, his face white. His mouth flutters open like he wants to say something but he can’t.

Vernon can’t take his eyes away from Seungkwan’s because if he does he’ll be able to process just how high they are. “Hold on to me,” he demands instead, voice cracking desperately. “Please, Seungkwan, hold on.”

Seungkwan’s mouth opens and closes again, and he manages to tighten his fingers around Vernon’s arm in turn, but it barely helps at all.

Vernon worms his other hand out from underneath him and he grips Seungkwan’s arm with that one too, both shoulders now hanging out over the edge of the walkway. He shifts against the wooden boards of the floor and something hard digs into his chest – it’s his mother’s necklace, he realizes belatedly, caught between his body and the ground.

That in turn triggers another thought, and Vernon squeezes his eyes shut, the side of his face pressed to his arm. “Seungkwan,” he gasps out, shoulders straining now with supporting his weight. “Try to grab me with your other hand.”

After a tense moment where the prince’s weight swings unsteadily below him he manages to grab onto Vernon’s other arm, just under the elbow. Meanwhile, Vernon closes his eyes so tight that white patches burst behind his eyelids, and prays.

 _Back during the lunar celebration, you said that I had much more to do here in the South,_ he thinks, desperately, to anyone that will listen. _I can’t do that without him._

For a breathless moment he thinks that it’s useless. He can feel his muscles burning with the strain of holding up Seungkwan, and his arms are beginning to shake.

Then, from nowhere, it’s like a gentle hand only half-made of physical matter brushes through his hair. _You have done well by yourself up until this point_. The words whisper through his head like a dream, the voice soft and feminine – it sounds a little like Nayoung, although there’s a tinge of something older and maternal like his mother. _I hope you will continue to do so, with this little riptide by your side._ _You have the means to change the South for good._

The warmth of the voice seeps into his bones and Vernon feels his arms regain their strength. Seungkwan’s weight grows just a hair lighter, and Vernon manages to readjust his knees underneath his body just enough that he can use them as leverage to haul Seungkwan up.

First it’s just a few inches, Vernon’s shoulders screaming with the work and his the muscles of his abdomen clenching, but then it’s further, enough for him to sit up slightly and adjust his grip to better pull Seungkwan. The hand in his hair drifts away, leaving a trail of goosebumps down his neck and spine, but he almost instantly forgets about it because then he pulls Seungkwan high enough up that he can fall backwards on his ass and let the motion yank the prince up over the edge.

All he can do at first is just clutch the prince in his arms, bury his face in his neck, and hold him close. Now that the golden-warm feeling of whatever presence he heard before has left him Vernon’s hands are shaking again, adrenaline quickly seeping out of his bones and leaving him shell-shocked and weak.

Seungkwan, for his part, has apparently regained his voice now that there’s solid ground under him again. “Oh my god, what the fuck, how’d you – are you okay? Oh my god.” His voice is shaking too, and he keeps moving his hands on Vernon’s back as if checking him over for injuries.

Vernon just presses his eyes tighter to the warm skin at the junction of Seungkwan’s neck and shoulder and releases a slow breath.

Seungkwan’s weight is heavy and comforting, essentially kneeling in Vernon’s lap. His hands flutter up to card through Vernon’s hair, and the feeling sends more shivers down his spine. “Seriously,” he says, his voice a bit lower and less manic now. “Are you okay?”

Vernon takes a second to conduct inventory. His hands are shaking, although he has them fisted in the robes covering Seungkwan’s back in an attempt to still them, and he’s broken out in a sweat at his temples. His shoulders and biceps ache, and he’s pretty sure he ripped the knee of his pants when he dived to the ground to grab Seungkwan.

He pulls back enough to be able to look up at Seungkwan. The prince’s hair is a messy halo around his face, which is pinched and worried – as if Vernon could be in a worse place than himself, the one who was actually moments away from death just seconds ago. “I’m fine,” he manages to say after some time, and Seungkwan seems to melt with relief.

“Of course you are.” The prince breaks out into a grin, bright and sunny. “My hero, how the hell did you do that?”

Vernon blinks, feeling like he should have dark sunspots on his vision from how blinding Seungkwan’s expression is. “I just – I think I, um, might have had some help.” He shakes his head, clearing his thoughts, and clutches Seungkwan’s sides tighter. “You almost died.”

“I almost did.” Seungkwan looks dazed, but his smile hasn’t slipped. “You know how my spirit reading warned my about open windows ages ago?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m thinking I should get a refund, they didn’t say _anything_ about barred-off rooftops.”

Vernon can’t help the laugh that punches out of him, fingers twitching against the bones of Seungkwan’s hips. His outer robe has slipped off of one side, from when his arm was dangling below his body, and the fabric of his inner robe is thin enough that Vernon can feel the heat of his skin through it. “I think a goddess may have helped me pull you up.”

Seungkwan laughs too, the sound bursting like bubbles. “Really?”

“Really.” The sky is so, so blue behind Seungkwan, and it makes his skin look warm and golden now that it’s no longer pale with fear. “I’m, um. I’m really glad that you didn’t die.”

Seungkwan snorts, expression thick with a fondness that makes Vernon want to squirm awkwardly, but all he does is twitch when the prince moves his hands down to cup Vernon’s jaw in both palms. “Between you and a goddess, I don’t know why I was so worried.”

Vernon feels weak with the amount of gratitude that he feels burning up his throat, suffocating in the pressure of it. “Why did you come up here in the first place?”

Seungkwan blinks, taken by surprise by the question, but then his face shifts to something slightly ashamed. “I, uh, may have gotten last minute cold feet.” He swipes his thumbs at Vernon’s hairline comfortingly. “It’s nothing personal, I just… I panicked, all of a sudden, that I was doing something awful.”

He shifts his weight just a bit but doesn’t move to get off of Vernon. “I felt… I felt like I was taking advantage,” Seungkwan continues, tone low and hushed now, like he’s breathing something secret into the air between them. “I guess… I was worried, that I felt more about this than you did.”

“This?”

“You know.” Seungkwan’s thumb twitches against Vernon’s jaw, and he flushes a little. “The engagement. It started off just being convenient, but slowly… It started to mean more, to me, I think.”

Vernon watches Seungkwan’s throat bob as he swallows. The cut from the knife is still there, although it’s stopped bleeding, and now just looks like a short, thin, red line on the side of his neck. Without thinking he brings a hand up and carefully brushes a thumb over the line, and the prince freezes on top of him.

“How much more?”

Seungkwan glances at him, eyes searching. He must have gotten all made up for the wedding, Vernon realizes, although the black lining his eyes is smudged at the corners. The prince’s mouth firms into a line and then he digs his thumbs a little more into Vernon’s jawline. “You’re just being a jerk, aren’t you?”

Vernon can’t help but grin a little unsteadily and move his hand back down to press at the small of Seungkwan’s back. “That would be awfully inappropriate of me, to be acting like that with royalty.”

Seungkwan huffs but Vernon can see the wet shine to his eyes when he looks back up at him. “I’m in love with you, I guess, although you’re really testing that right now.”

It wasn’t like Vernon hadn’t been expecting those words – something about the way that the prince’s eyes turned gentle and soft when they woke up together that morning had hinted at it. He hadn’t wanted to believe it, though. He hadn’t wanted to think that this was something he could have, that he could have Seungkwan solid and real in his arms and looking at him like he was the most wonderfully irritating thing on the planet.

Hearing it spoken out loud, with the sky wide and clear behind Seungkwan and his hair haloed in sunlight, high above a city that is no longer quite so strange – it makes all the difference.

“I’m gonna kiss you now,” he hears himself saying, and Seungkwan squawks a little but responds just as firmly when Vernon makes good on that promise. The prince almost immediately moves closer, pushing their chests flush together as he kisses back, hands twitching frantically to cup Vernon’s jaw.

It’s like sunlight, like the roll of the tide pulling them closer together. Seungkwan makes happy, hurried noises against Vernon’s mouth, and presses so close that they end up toppling over so that Vernon’s on his back, only narrowly missing banging his head against the center pillar of the tower roof.

Seungkwan moves with him and peers down at him. His lips are red and Vernon really wishes they were kissing again, but instead the prince just folds his hands on Vernon’s chest and props his chin on them.

Then, after a second of silent pouting – “Don’t you have something to say?”

Vernon laughs and tilts his head back to look up at the sky. “I’m so fucking in love with you it’s stupid. Is that ok? I agreed to marry you because I think I already knew that I wanted to spend more time with you, and then you just had to go on being wonderful and fun and crazy.”

Seungkwan hums, pleased, and shifts up to bracket Vernon’s head with his elbows. “That sounds about right,” he says, smirk only lasting a second before it bursts into a wide smile and he pushes back in to kiss Vernon again.

 

It takes a good ten minutes for Vernon to finally convince Seungkwan that they should probably head back down off the tower. Each time he tries to push them both up Seungkwan manages to yank him back down and go right back to kissing, and Vernon’s only human so he doesn’t do the best job of denying the prince in that.

Eventually they do manage to leave, once Vernon agrees to let Seungkwan thread their fingers together proudly. They begin to hear the noise of the castle compound once they get halfway down the ramp of the tower, and when they emerge outside it’s to immediately face a harried, sweaty Lord Soonyoung.

He gapes a little at the two of them before shaking it off and rushing forward to grab the prince. “You’re here! You both are.” He glances at Vernon, taking stock of the ripped knee of his trousers and the dust packed into the front of his white shirt, before looking back to Seungkwan. “What the fuck happened?”

Seungkwan laughs a little wildly and clutches Soonyoung back. “How much do you know already?”

Soonyoung just shakes his head. “The guards caught that Eastern kid trying to leave out the servant’s entrance. He’s really shaken up; he’s refusing to talk to anyone. He had a knife,” he continues, and his gaze darts to the thin gash on the prince’s neck. “So I assume he had something to do with that?”

Seungkwan nods and exchanges a quick glance with Vernon. “Someone hired him to assassinate Jinseol,” he says, and Soonyoung jerks in surprise. “Obviously he got the wrong royal – I don’t think he was expecting us to be in identical robes.”

Soonyoung’s mouth twists, concerned. “But you’re ok, right?” Belatedly he checks the prince over for injuries. “The kid got spooked and ran without trying anything, then.”

“Mostly.” Seungkwan pulls away from Soonyoung when another man jogs up to them. He’s tall and handsome, with a sharp nose and a worried angle to his eyebrows.

“You found them?” Seungkwan makes a surprised noise when the man cups his hand gently around the back of Soonyoung’s neck, who turns to look up at him.

“Yeah, looks like everything’s alright.” Soonyoung blinks and looks over at Seungkwan, then grins so wide that his eyes narrow into catlike slits. “Oh, that’s right.” He reaches up and slaps the man right on the center of his back, so hard that it sends him stumbling a step forward. “Seokmin, meet Prince Seungkwan.”

Seungkwan peers up at the man – Seokmin, although Vernon’s never heard that name before – and then laughs loudly. “Your suitor?”

Seokmin sputters and Soonyoung just flaps a hand. “Things are a little more serious these days, your highness. He’s certainly suited me.”

They’re quickly found by a set of guards, who hurry them over to the royal family. Seungkwan is immediately piled on by his sisters, Jinseol in her matching robes and Sejeong in her red priestess outfit. The two continue to fuss over him while the queen and one of the heads of the royal guard question Seungkwan and Vernon in low voices about their would-be assassin.

“He just seems so scared,” Jinseol confides to them once the queen pulls away to talk to the guards. “You should see him; he’s shaking himself apart in the cell that they put him in for questioning.”

“He wanted to _kill_ you,” Seungkwan reminds her, sounding more sure of himself than the way he’s still tightly holding onto Vernon’s hand would have him seem.

“But for his mother, right?” She starts and waves to someone over Seungkwan’s shoulder, and they both turn to see Joshua hurrying over, General Seungcheol in his dress uniform close on his heels.

“You two are taking years off of my life,” Joshua hisses once he gets close enough to grab their shoulders. “We were looking everywhere for you.”

Vernon glances shiftily at the prince. “ _I_ didn’t tell anyone that I was going anywhere.”

“Yeah, but once you were both gone for longer than twenty minutes a few more people than just your handmaids noticed.” Joshua’s mouth narrows in frustration, but then he sighs and wilts a little. “I’m glad you’re both alright.”

“Seriously,” Seungcheol huffs once he pulls up next to Joshua. “You have to stop ducking your guard like that, Seungkwan. This is exactly what they’re trained to deal with.”

Seungkwan scoffs and eyes the hand that Seungcheol has seemingly instinctively places at Joshua’s hip. “Maybe they just shouldn’t be so easily distracted that they lose track of me – do you have any experience with that? Being distracted?”

Seungcheol flushes but tugs Joshua a little closer to him. “You’re always going to be ridiculous, aren’t you?”

Joshua just sighs and tucks his hands into the long sleeves of his Southern-style robe, the slight red tint to the tips of his ears the only sign that he’s embarrassed by the attention. “What about the Eastern agent? Why was he going after you?”

Seungkwan shrugs. “It sounded like someone high-up in the East had something on him. It was his mother,” he continues, gaze dipping down to the ground and tone turning contemplative and sad. “She has Eastern river fever, and they convinced him that they would give him an antidote if he did what they said. I had to tell him that we don’t have any cure for river fever, I can’t imagine what he’s thinking right now.”

Vernon watches as Joshua’s expression changes, curious. “Eastern river fever?” Seungkwan nods, and Joshua’s brows pinch together in thought. “That’s strange.”

“What?”

“It might be nothing.” He bites at his lip. “Just… I have some old, old holistic medicinal texts, from my collection when I was apprenticing in the East. I could have sworn that there was something in there for Eastern river fever.”

“Seriously?” Seungkwan’s grip tightens on Vernon’s hand in excitement. “We need to tell him; he shouldn’t get a horribly harsh sentence, anyways, it wasn’t his fault.”

“He tried to _push you off the tower_ ,” Vernon can’t help but remind Seungkwan, but the prince just dismisses him with a flap of his hand.

“We all do dumb things for the people we love,” he responds. “What we really need to do is to talk to that Eastern prince.”

Seungkwan spins and moves to drag Vernon off, leaving Joshua and Seungcheol sputtering “You got pushed off the tower?” in their wake.

Prince Junhui is completely shocked when Seungkwan and Vernon confront him about the assassin. It would seem fake, but the prince’s face is so open and easy to read that there’s no way it could be anything but genuine when he demands all the information they have about the situation.

“I truly, truly had no idea,” he rushes to tell Seungkwan, hands fluttering to his mouth in panic. “Minghao has worked for my family for years. I didn’t think anything of bringing him on this visit.”

“I don’t think Minghao had anything really to do with it,” Seungkwan assures him, swinging Vernon and his hands in between them. “He was trying to help his mother. Oh, and I have a scholar who you should talk to,” he continues. “He may be able to help you convince Minghao that you’re not just going to toss him over the side of the ship when you bring him back to the East.”

Junhui looks at Seungkwan with the same dazed expression that everyone has been giving him after the whole incident and then nods slowly. “I’ll do that.”

Seungkwan nods back and then spins to drag Vernon away from the Eastern group that stands, huddled, surrounded by a handful of Southern guards. When they get a few yards away Seungkwan lets out a held breath shakily and flops a bit more against Vernon’s side. “Is it awful,” he says quietly, “if the last thing I want to do today is get married to you?”

Vernon laughs and shifts to wrap an arm around the prince’s side, the movement already easy and familiar. “I would say that the capital has had enough excitement for the day.”

“It’s not that I don’t want to get married to you _ever_ ,” Seungkwan insists, peering up at him with concern. “I do. I really, really do.” He pauses to smack a fond, cheeky kiss onto Vernon’s mouth, and then pulls back again. “Especially now that this is, like, actually a thing. But maybe we can reschedule to a day when I haven’t been in life-threatening peril?”

“Makes sense to me.” Vernon can’t help but duck back in to kiss the prince properly, ignoring the bustle of servants and guards that pass by them on their way somewhere. “I’m certainly in no state to go through a fancy ceremony right now, either.”

Seungkwan plucks at the dirty front of his shirt, a smile pulling at the edges of his mouth. “We certainly can’t have that.” He sighs a little and then smiles fully. “I do love you, you know.” His voice is soft, like something meant only for him.

“Yeah.” Vernon lets himself tip his head down to press their foreheads together. “I do too.”

 

 

 

_Dear brother (and Seungkwan),_

_Mother told me that I should write to let you know that we’ve arrived home safely. The trip was easier this time around, and Joshua let me read a few of the books from his collection while we were on the ship. I’m lucky I don’t get seasick reading like you do, brother. He’s really nice – he said that he’s going to look into doing research for the university in the city, and if he does he’ll come over for dinner sometimes with the General._

_I can’t believe I ended up staying in the South for an extra three weeks and you still didn’t show me any dragons. You’ve failed me entirely as a brother. The wedding was nice, though, once it actually happened. I promise that no one even noticed when you tripped, Vernon – and if they did they wouldn’t dare say anything. You’re royalty now, after all._

_The General (he’s very handsome, Seungkwan, I don’t know why you would give him up for my brother of all people) says that they’re moving forward to negotiate a lighter sentence for that Eastern man. Joshua’s pretty certain that there is a folk cure for river fever, he just has to narrow down which of his millions of dusty books it’s in. He sounds hopeful, though, so I think it’ll all be ok._

_With all the excitement I never got that journal back from you. I still want those stories about the South, so you better keep up on your homework. I’ll be back to visit someday, I’m sure, and I’ll expect updated entries._

_Love,_

_Sophia_

_P.S. I really am happy for you, even if you are a dumb boy. Also, you desperately need a haircut – Seungkwan better make you get one._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's the end. These last two chapters may have seemed rushed but they've been stewing for a long time in my brain, and I just needed the push of a deadline to get me to finish them. 
> 
> THANK YOU to everyone who has stuck with me from day one and been reading and commenting along the way. You all have helped me keep my energy for this story, and I really do love the way it turned out. I hope that you like it, and that you continue to like my writing.
> 
> You all are the best, and I love each one of you!
> 
> (again with the 'be my friend' plugs, you can find me on tumblr at boo98, and on twitter at ponyoprince)


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